Lizzo Sued Over Unreleased Track Sampling 1970s Song

Los Angeles, CA — Lizzo is facing a lawsuit from GRC Trust, which claims the singer unlawfully sampled their copyrighted song “Win or Lose (We Tried)” in her unreleased track tentatively titled “I’m Goin’ In Till October.” The legal action was filed in California after a snippet of the song went viral on social media.

The brief clip, posted in August, references actress Sydney Sweeney and her advertisements for American Eagle. Critics initially scrutinized the company for perceived associations with white supremacism when pairing Sweeney with the slogan about having “good genes.”

According to GRC Trust, which owns the rights to the original 1970s song, Lizzo’s sampling has led to lost profits for them, despite the song being unreleased. “We are surprised that The GRC Trust filed this lawsuit,” Lizzo’s representative stated. “To be clear, the song has never been commercially released or monetized, and no decision has been made regarding any future commercial release of the song.”

The legal complaint claims that GRC Trust attempted to resolve the issue informally with Lizzo’s team, but negotiations reached an impasse. They are seeking an injunction to prevent further distribution of the song and restitution for their losses.

The snippet features Lizzo rapping, “I got good jeans like I’m Sydney,” which became widely shared alongside a video of her washing a Porsche in a denim outfit.

Interestingly, the song has not been registered with any copyright or royalty societies, raising questions about how profits could have been obtained from a mere clip. Nevertheless, GRC Trust maintains that Lizzo and Atlantic Records have profited from their claimed infringement.

This lawsuit isn’t the first legal challenge Lizzo has faced regarding her music. In 2019, she was sued for her hit “Truth Hurts” but eventually reached an out-of-court agreement with the parties involved. Separately, GRC Trust is also involved in another lawsuit against Kanye West for sampling another one of Sam Dees‘ works.

As of now, Lizzo has removed the original posts featuring the snippet from her social media accounts.