Waits V. Audi (2000)

In 2000 Tom Waits, the American Musician, was approached by Audi asking if they could feature “Innocent When you Dream”, a song by Waits, for their commercials in Spain. Waits declined the offer. He has refused every request for companies to use his music in their commercials on the grounds that he doesn’t like people branding themselves with a product. He’s quoted “If Michael Jackson wants to work for Pepsi, why doesn't he just get himself a suit and an office in their headquarters and be done with it?". He has also made comments on advertising with celebrities, "Apparently, the highest compliment our culture grants artists nowadays is to be in an ad — ideally, naked and purring on the hood of a new car," he said in a statement, referring to the Mercury Cougar. "I have adamantly and repeatedly refused this dubious honor."
After Audi asked Waits if they could use his song and he declined, Audi released commercials in Spain with a song extremely similar to “Innocent When you Dream”. It was, in fact, a variation of the song with a sound-alike singer. Waits filed a suit and a Spanish court ruled that Waits’ moral rights and the copyright on that song were violated. It would not have been as big of a violation if they hadn’t used a sound alike singer. Waits argued that he has his own “sound” created by his gravely voice. He was given compensation from Audi but gave most of it to a charity. He joked about the incident later saying “the company got the name of the song wrong, thinking it was called "Innocent When You Scheme".“


Here is a link to the song "Innocent When You Dream":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Md7iv0Rg1LU

Laws broken see: http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap5.html

I think that Waits was very much in the right when he filed suit against Audi. The company came to him with a request to use his material, he denied them that right and they turn around and hire a sound alike singer to sing the same song. What is that? Instead of moving on and changing the song they had chosen, they just tried to go behind Waits’ back knowing full well they didn’t have the artists blessing. What did you think he was going to do? Be o.k. with it and say, “I think that now the ad is out with my music in it, I kind of like it”. No! Audi was probably aware of Waits’ steadfast opposition to have his music in advertisements but still went ahead and put the song in their commercial.
The idea of it being illegal to use someone’s “sound” is off putting because it limits people’s creativity. Perhaps this sound alike singer didn’t even know he sounded like Tom Waits. Maybe he had no idea who Waits was and was approached by Audi to do this TV spot. Still it wasn’t really about Waits’ sound it was more about the fact that he refused to let them use his music and they did anyway.