This isn’t the type of record Jay Z is used to making. In October, the Brooklyn rapper and mogul will be taking the stand at the trial for a lawsuit over a sample in his Timbaland-produced hit “Big Pimpin.”
Reports The Hollywood Reporter:
Sixteen years ago, the music producer Tim “Timbaland” Mosley worked with Shawn “Jay Z” Carter on a track for the album, Vol. 3 … Life and Times of S. Carter.
At the recording session, Timbaland grabbed a CD that contained Middle Eastern music he believed to be in the public domain. He found a particularly distinctive Egyptian composition — the kind of song one might expect to be played for a bellydance. Timbaland focused on a particular measure of this song with an amazing flute melody and looped it. Jay Z’s rap (“You know I, thug em, f— em, love em, leave em”) came on top. And so, “Big Pimpin” was created. Rolling Stone magazine has since called it one of the 500 greatest songs of all time.
When Jay Z’s hit came out, a foreign subsidiary of EMI identified the sample as coming from the Baligh Hamdi composition “Khosara, Khosara” from the 1960 Egyptian film Fata ahlami. EMI claimed rights stemming from a deal with an Egyptian outfit that had made its own agreement with Hamdi’s heirs. Timbaland then paid $100,000 to EMI for rights to use the sample, and that money was supposed to end any dispute. Except it didn’t.
The lawsuit has finally been scheduled to start on October 13, and both Jay Z and Timbaland will be testifying.
It is Osama Ahmed Fahmy, Hamdi’s nephew, who filed the lawsuit back in 2007.
Hova and Timb’s side believe they licensed the song properly, with Fahmy even getting a payment for the license from the Egyptian company. As for Fahmy, his side is saying that permission to use the song was never properly granted by Hamdi’s family.
We’re sure the millions he is seeking has something to do with his passion for his uncle’s work, too.
Peep more of the intricate details of this lawsuit over at THR.
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Photo: WENN.com
