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By Chris Cooke | Printed on Thursday 26 January 2023
A authorized dispute over samples within the Unhealthy Bunny observe ‘Safaera’ is near settlement, in keeping with a brand new authorized submitting.
An organization known as BM Data sued Bad Bunny and his team back in 2021 claiming that ‘Safaera’ – which appeared on the 2020 album ‘YHLQMDLG’ – contained uncleared samples taken from a sequence of influential mixtapes produced by DJ Playero and launched by the label.
The document firm, which was an early champion of the reggaeton style because it was first rising in Puerto Rico within the Nineteen Nineties, famous in its lawsuit that evaluations of the Unhealthy Bunny observe had referenced the DJ Playero connection. Pitchfork, for instance, had known as it “a five-minute tribute to DJ Playero’s style defining mixtapes of the Nineteen Nineties”.
The lawsuit then acknowledged that different samples on ‘Safaera’ had seemingly been correctly licensed by Unhealthy Bunny’s label, however that hadn’t occurred with the samples that got here from three Playero works: ‘Chocha Con Bicho’, ‘Besa Tu Cuerpo’ and ‘Sigan Bailando’.
DJ Playero himself posted on Instagram to emphasize that he was not concerned in anyway within the litigation, which he known as an “unlucky scenario”. He additionally expressed his “respect” for Unhealthy Bunny and his collaborators on ‘Safaera’.
However, the lawsuit continued to undergo the motions, with a mediation session organised earlier this month. In a brand new authorized submitting with the courtroom, each side within the dispute affirm that “a settlement in precept was reached on the mediation” which is “topic to full execution of a binding written settlement settlement”.
“A draft of a settlement settlement has been circulated”, the submitting continues, “however the events anticipate this course of to take a while because the settlement is complicated and would require the evaluation and approval of a number of company and particular person events”.
With that in thoughts, these concerned within the lawsuit request that the courtroom pause the litigation whereas the ultimate particulars of the settlement are agreed. For sure, the phrases of that settlement weren’t shared.