"Truth Hurts," the second longest-running No. 1 hit tied to a female rapper,Lizzo, with six weeks atop the Billboard's Hot 100 chart is coming under fire by a pair of songwriting brothers. The New York Times is reporting the brothers say they lay claim to a key line in the song. The song’s official credits list four writers: Lizzo, Ricky Reed, her primary producer; Tele, another producer; and Jesse Saint John. But a pair of songwriting brothers, Justin and Jeremiah Raisen, say they were involved in an early writing session with Lizzo that incorporated a tweet into the song’s signature lyric,“I just took a DNA test, turns out I’m 100 percent that bitch” and were denied credit. The brothers praise Lizzo as a singular and inspiring force. “What she is doing for culture is unlike anything we’ve seen a modern pop star do, maybe ever,” they said in an interview. But as their efforts to obtain credit and a share of the royalties have dragged on without resolution, they decided to speak out.
Lizzo's attorney, Cynthia S. Arato, says the brothers have no claim to the song in any way and in fact did not collaborate with Lizzo on the song. In a New York Times article, according to the Raisen brothers, they held a joint songwriting session in April 2017 with Lizzo and two other writers, Saint John and Yves Rothman. While the five of them worked on a song called “Healthy,” the brothers said, Saint John pulled up a meme on his phone based on a tweet that read: “I did a DNA test and found out I’m 100% that bitch.” They all laughed, and Jeremiah said that he suggested including the lyric in the song.
Source: The New York Times
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