H.E.R. Settles Copyright Lawsuit Over 2016 Song ‘Focus’

A lawsuit filed against H.E.R., as well as DJ Camper, Justin Love and Sony Music Entertainment, over the 2016 song “Focus” has reached a settlement, Billboard has learned.

The complaint, which was filed in the U.S. District Court in Southern New York in June 2020, alleged that the song “Focus” intentionally infringed upon Andre Sims’ original composition “Endless Minds” without receiving his consent or giving him compensation. Sims, a songwriter and piano player who’s worked with artists like Stevie Wonder, created the song in 2004, posted it on Instagram and YouTube in 2015, and registered it with the U.S. Copyright Office in January 2020.

During an Instagram Live video, Camper (real name Darhyl Camper Jr.) said Sims’ song “Endless Minds” did inspire the melody of “Focus,” which he co-wrote with H.E.R. (real name Gabriella Wilson) and Love (real name Justin Anthony Barroso) and co-produced with H.E.R. Sims initially filed a $3 million lawsuit that accused the trio and the song’s distributor Sony of copyright infringement and requested injunctive and monetary relief.

The original complaint alleged, “To write and record ‘Focus,’ and ultimately to produce, perform, distribute and otherwise exploit ‘Focus,’ Defendants [H.E.R., Camper, Love and Sony] copied ‘Endless Minds,’ to which they had prior access, resulting in the song ‘Focus,’ which is so similar to ‘Endless Minds’ that the ordinary observer could easily determine that the songs sound the same in their essential compositional and other elements.”

Terms of the settlement were not disclosed.

“I’m happy we could reach a resolution, and would like to thank everyone for their support and prayers,” Sims said in an official statement. He’s represented by James L. Walker Jr. and Renorda Pryor. Walker, of the Atlanta-based law firm J. Walker and Associates LLP, previously sued Sony BMG Music Entertainment for interfering with their musical clients’ contractual relationships in 2005.

“At this point, we have nothing more to say then we are pleased to see the case resolved and settled. Now, all parties can move on with their lives,” Walker said. “Special thanks to all of the attorneys involved who worked tirelessly to close this matter out.”

Reps for H.E.R. had not returned Billboard’s request for comment at press time.

While “Focus” barely cracked the Billboard Hot 100, hitting No. 100 in 2018, it secured the singer/songwriter her first-ever No. 1 on a Billboard songs chart when it topped the Adult R&B Airplay tally the same year. “Focus” dethroned Ella Mai’s “Boo’d Up” to reach the top spot but eventually lost to Mai’s hit at both the 2018 Soul Train Music Awards, where “Focus” was up for the Ashford & Simpson’s songwriters award, and 2019 Grammy Awards, where H.E.R.’s song was nominated for best R&B song. H.E.R. performed “Focus” at the 2018 BET Awards, on the Today show in 2019 and, most recently, at her Hollywood Bowl show with the LA Philharmonic last week.

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Tom T. Hall, ‘Storyteller’ Country Singer & Songwriter, Dies at 85

Tom T. Hall, known for penning hits including Jeannie C. Riley’s massive 1968 pop and country smash “Harper Valley P.T.A.,” as well as his own crossover hit “I Love,” died Aug. 20, 2021, at age 85.

Nicknamed “The Storyteller,” Hall, who was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2019, was renowned for his songs’ rich narratives, vivid descriptions and homespun observations.

“Somebody said, ‘Tom T. Hall and Kristofferson, they’re the only two guys who can describe Dolly Parton without using their hands,’” Hall quipped in a 2019 interview with Billboard’s Tom Roland prior to his Songwriters Hall of Fame induction.

“Few could tell a story like Tom T. Hall,” Country Music Association CEO Sarah Trahern said in a statement following his death. “As a singer, songwriter and instrumentalist, he was one of those triple threat artists who continued to make an impact on the next generation. I’ll  always remember growing up listening to Tom T.’s music with my father, who was a huge bluegrass and Country fan.”

Hall was inducted into the Grand Ole Opry in 1971, the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1978, the Kentucky Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2002, and the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2008. He received the poet’s award from the Academy of Country Music in 2010.

“Tom T. Hall’s masterworks vary in plot, tone, and tempo, but they are bound by his ceaseless and unyielding empathy for the triumphs and losses of others,” Country Music Hall of Fame CEO Kyle Young posted following news of Hall’s death. “My bet is we won’t see the likes of him again, but if we do I’ll be first in line for tickets to the show.”

Hall, who often gifted friends with homemade moonshine from his own still, was born May 25, 1936, in Olive Hill, Ky. By the time he was a teenager, Hall had joined his first bluegrass band, the Kentucky Travelers. He also worked as a DJ before he joined the Army in 1957.

When he returned to Virginia following his military service, he impressed Nashville publisher Jimmy Key, and Key placed Hall’s “D.J. for a Day” with Jimmy C. Newman, who earned a Hot Country Songs top 10 hit with it in 1963-64.

Hall moved to Nashville on New Year’s Day 1964 from Virginia, with a publishing deal in hand. He earned his first No. 1  as a songwriter in 1965 when “Hello Vietnam,” recorded by Johnny Wright, topped Hot Country Songs. Cuts by dozens of artists followed, including by Johnny Cash, Bobby Bare, Loretta Lynn,Waylon Jennings and, more recently, Alan Jackson’s Hot Country Songs No. 1 “Little Bitty” in 1996.

Though a rarity now, Hall tended to write alone instead of enlisting other songwriters. “I said very arrogantly one time that writing a song is like writing a letter to your mother: You don’t need three or four guys to help you do it,” Hall told Billboard in 2019. “I know that sounds arrogant, but I was just never any good at it.”

Mercury Records Nashville signed Hall to his own recording contract, though Hall doubted being an artist was his strength. He was wrong. Fans and radio gravitated toward his conversational delivery.

“I was listening to the radio one day, and somebody said, ‘That sounds like a Tom T. Hall song,’” he told Billboard. “I said, ‘I must be doing something a little different than everybody else because now there’s such a thing as a Tom T. Hall song, and I’m going to buy into that.’ We look for a little distinction in the world to tell one person from another.”

As an artist, Hall amassed 50 songs on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart, including seven No. 1 hits: “A Week in Country Jail,” “The Year That Clayton Delaney Died,” “(Old Dogs-Children And) Watermelon Wine,” “I Love,” “Country Is,” “I Care” and “Faster Horses (The Cowboy and the Poet).”

Hall’s highest-charting hit on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100 as an artist was “I Love,” which reached No. 12 in March 1974.

Hall landed seven top 10 albums on Billboard’s Top Country Albums chart, including reaching No. 1 on that chart with The Rhymer and Other Five and Dimers in June 1973.

He received seven CMA Awards nominations over the course of his career, including five in 1973 alone, though he never took home an award. He was nominated that year for entertainer, male vocalist and album, single and song of the year.

He garnered six Grammy nods, including song of the year (1968) for writing “Harper Valley, P.T.A.,” but he won his only Grammy in an unlikely category: best album notes for writing the liner notes for his 1972 album Tom T. Hall’s Greatest Hits.

Long after he had retired as a songwriter, a few of Hall’s songs found favor with beer brands, much to his and his pocketbook’s delight. Michelob Ultra used his 1975 hit “I Like Beer” in a 2018 commercial, while Coors Light, more improbably, licensed the sentimental “I Love” for an advertising campaign.

“It enhanced my bank account a half-million dollars,” Hall said of the Coors campaign. “I heard the commercials all the time, but I had no idea what they were singing about. That’s why they paid so much money for it: They wanted the ability to rewrite it.”

In addition to his gifts as a songwriter, he also provided solace just by his presence as a towering figure in Nashville. “In 1978 when we sang at Mama Maybelle Carter’s funeral, a saddened Johnny Cash walked up to the podium and asked Tom T. Hall to stand with him,” the Oak Ridge Boys posted on Twitter. “Johnny said ‘I draw strength from you Tom!’ Thank you Tom T. Hall for the song’s and the strength you provided to so many.”

Hall’s beloved wife of 50 years, Dixie — a songwriter herself, whom he met at the BMI Country Awards in 1964 — died in 2015. He is survived by his son, Dean.

–Assistance in preparing this story provided by Jessica Nicholson and Paul Grein

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‘American Idol’ Singer Syesha Mercado Reunited With Infant Daughter — UPDATE

UPDATE: Syesha Mercado’s partner, Tyler Deener, announced in a video posted Friday (Aug. 20) that they had been reunited with their infant daughter, Ast, after handing her over to authorities earlier this month. “AST IS HOME!!!!” the four-minute video is captioned. “#BringRaHome POWER TO THE PEOPLE!!!!!!” The couple is still fighting for the return of their toddler son, Amen’Ra, who was put in foster care in February.

Original story: Former American Idol third-place finisher Syesha Mercado is fighting to regain custody of her two young children, both of whom have been removed from her care by Florida authorities over the past six months.

The 34 year-old posted an hour-long video Aug. 11 of what she said was footage of a fleet of sheriff’s officers surrounding her car and removing her 10-day-old infant daughter as the singer cried, “This is so wrong! This is my baby! My baby is healthy and happy! … I’m not a danger to my baby!”

The post, captioned, “THEY TOOK OUR BABY AGAIN!” came more than six months after her toddler son was placed into foster care in February. The action was taken after the singer and her partner, Tyron Deener, took 1-year-old Amen’Ra to a hospital in St. Petersburg, Fla., for treatment for dehydration as he struggled to gain weight while transitioning from breast milk to solid foods, according to a group supporting Mercado, We Have the Right to be Right.

The Manatee Sheriff’s Office told Billboard that law enforcement “executed a pick-up order signed by a family court judge” on Aug. 10.

The Herald-Tribune reported that authorities took the baby girl to the hospital after deputies gave the couple a court order to turn her over for a checkup even after they informed the officers that they had been to the doctor the day before. At press time, it was unclear if the infant was still in custody, but sheriff’s deputies told NBC News that they took the baby girl because the couple failed to inform authorities that Mercado had given birth in the middle of the custody battle over Amen’Ra.

According to NBC, Amen’Ra was assessed in February by Dr. Sally Smith, a physician who was the subject of a USA Today investigation over accusations that she was too quick to diagnose child abuse. A review of hundreds of Smith’s cases reportedly found more than a dozen instances where charges were dropped or parents were acquitted after a traumatizing experience.

As they plead with authorities in the video, Deener says, “Can you have some empathy? Y’all done took our son, now you’re taking our daughter,” telling authorities that the couple asked that all questions go through their attorney, which he claims did not happen. Deener assures officers in the video that the baby had gone in for a checkup the day before and was deemed healthy.

Amen’Ra was placed into the Manatee Child Protective Services by order of a judge. The Manatee County Sheriff’s Office also told Billboard that it had received information from Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital abuse line that the boy was “suffering from severe malnutrition/failure to thrive,” which, according to NBC, Mercado disputed.

Amen’Ra was later reportedly discharged to a white foster family — Mercado and Deener are Black — with Mercado saying she was not informed and no family members were contacted for possible placement. Mercado gave birth to her daughter in the midst of the legal fight over custody of Amen’Ra.

At press time, Mercado and Deener had raised $388,170 (of a $200,000 goal) on a GoFundMe in which she says her son has been “kidnapped by the System” after she claimed authorities said the couple refused a B12 shot for Amen’Ra. “We never refused a B12 shot, and at no point was he on the verge of death,” she wrote on the GFM page. Billboard has reached out to Mercado for comment; a spokesperson for the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office’s Child Protection Unit had not yet returned requests for comment.

In addition to finishing third on the seventh season of Idol, Mercado has toured in Dreamgirls and performed in the Broadway company of The Book of Mormon, and was honored with a Syesha Mercado day in Sarasota in May 2008.

See the video of the police action below. (Warning: Clip contains intense situations.)

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Billie Eilish’s ‘Happier Than Ever’ Steady at No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Album Sales Chart

Billie Eilish’s Happier Than Ever is steady at No. 1 for a second week on Billboard’s Top Album Sales chart (dated Aug. 21). The set sold 36,000 copies in the U.S. in the week ending Aug. 12 (down 76% from its opening-week sales of 153,000).

Happier is ahead of five debuts on the tally at Nos. 2-6 from George Harrison, Barbra Streisand, Nas, BTS and Chris Young.

Thus far, Happier has sold 188,000 copies in the U.S. and ranks as the No. 7 biggest-selling album of 2021. Taylor Swift’s Evermore is the year’s top-seller, with 408,000 copies sold.

Billboard’s Top Album Sales chart ranks the top-selling albums of the week based only on traditional album sales. The chart’s history dates back to May 25, 1991, the first week Billboard began tabulating charts with electronically monitored piece count information from SoundScan, now MRC Data. Pure album sales were the measurement solely utilized by the Billboard 200 albums chart through the list dated Dec. 6, 2014, after which that chart switched to a methodology that blends album sales with track equivalent album units and streaming equivalent album units. For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both Twitter and Instagram.

George Harrison’s All Things Must Pass, first released in 1970, debuts on the 30-year-old Top Album Sales chart at No. 2 with 28,000 copies sold (up 6,426%), following the album’s 50th anniversary rerelease on Aug. 6. The album was newly mixed and reissued across a number of formats, and most were bolstered with an array of outtakes, jams and demos from the album’s recording sessions. All versions of the album are combined for sales tracking and charting purposes. All Things Must Pass is Harrison’s highest-charting album on the 30-year-old Top Album Sales chart.

Barbra Streisand’s from-the-vaults rarities compilation Release Me 2 bows at No. 3 on Top Album Sales with 21,000 copies sold. It’s the sequel to her 2012 archival effort Release Me, which debuted and peaked at No. 3.

On the Billboard 200, Release Me 2 starts at No. 15. With the debut, she becomes the only woman with new top 20, or even top 40, albums on the Billboard 200 in every decade from the 1960s through the 2020s.

Nas lands his 15th top 10 on Top Album Sales as King’s Disease II arrives at No. 4 with 19,000 sold. It also starts atop the equivalent album units-based Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums and Top Rap Albums charts (his 10th and fifth leaders on those tallies, respectively).

BTS’ Japanese-language hits compilation album BTS, The Best bows at No. 5 with 17,000 sold (following its physical CD release on Aug. 6, after only previously being available to purchase as a digital download).It also re-enters the units-based World Albums chart for its first week at No. 1, giving the act its 12th chart-topper. The album spent one previous week on the list (No. 15; June 26 chart) after its initial digital and streaming release on June 16.

Chris Young’s new studio album Famous Friends debuts at No. 6 on Top Album Sales with 14,000 sold. Further, it debuts at No. 3 on the units-ranked Top Country Albums chart, his eighth consecutive top 10 (comprising the entirety of his charting efforts).

Rounding out the new top 10 on Top Album Sales: Prince’s Welcome 2 America falls 2-7 in its second week (9,000; down 83%), Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours jumps 22-8 (just over 7,000; up 85% following its release on gold colored vinyl at Target on Aug. 6), Olivia Rodrigo’s Sour slips 7-9 (7,000; down 14%) and Taylor Swift’s Folklore descends 9-10 (nearly 7,000; down 10%).

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‘Selena’ Producer Allowed to Move Forward With Suit Against Selena Quintanilla’s Family

Selena producer Moctesuma Esparza has established a prima facie case that the father and sister of the late Tejano superstar Selena Quintanilla violated a contract by licensing the singer’s life rights to Netflix. That’s according to a ruling out on Thursday (Aug. 19) in Los Angeles Superior Court.

In 1997, two years after Selena died of a gunshot at the age of 23, Warner Bros. released Selena in theaters. In the nearly quarter-century since, she has remained popular. In fact, she’s one of the best-selling artists in Latin music history. In 2020, Netflix released Selena: The Series, which looked at the singer’s early life. That series starring Christian Serratos has prompted litigation.

According to Esparza, he and Selena’s father Abraham established a joint venture in 1995 that would be assigned movie and television rights to Selena’s stories. The following year, that venture made deals with Warner Bros., which produced a film starring Jennifer Lopez as the title character.

Esparza alleges that the joint venture was to hold onto rights until the expiration of the copyright of the movie while Selena’s family has insisted that a contract amendment had rights reverting back to the family. There appears to be a dispute over whether Warner Bros. had to consent to the reversion. Interestingly, there’s some indication from the court filings that when Warner Bros. learned of the Netflix series, it objected and soon achieved a settlement.

In any event, L.A. Superior Court judge Maurice Leiter has now ruled that Esparza’s contract claim against the Quintanilla family has sufficient merit to overcome a motion aimed at quickly defeating plaintiff’s claim. The judge also accepts claims of breach of fiduciary duty, breach of fair dealing, unjust enrichment, negligent misrepresentation and fraudulent concealment.

The family is at least successful in getting the judge to nix claims of tortious interference and misappropriation of publicity rights.

The judge’s ruling on those unsuccessful claims (read in full here) is likely a positive development for Netflix, which for now remains a co-defendant but is also challenging the basis of claims since it was hardly a party to dealmaking in the 1990s and insists every right to make a “highly transformative, biographical television series that involves a matter of public interest.”

This article was originally published by The Hollywood Reporter.

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