Grand Theft Theme

Tuned in to Big O on Cartoon Network to watch Big O and was surprised to see
that they had a new opening. And guess what they are using Barry Gray's UFO
theme for its theme music. I'm going over to Cartoon Network site and going to
give them a few well choosen words. It one thing to use the theme music in
bits and piece here in there but it another thing all thing to steal the theme
outright without giving due credit to the master.

James K.


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[hidden email] <[hidden email]> wrote:

> Tuned in to Big O on Cartoon Network to watch Big O and was surprised to see
> that they had a new opening.

Perhaps you should have complained to someone when this was first commented
on -- the 2nd season of Big O was shown in Japan a long time before it
started showing here. I even bought the Japanese soundtrack CD almost a
year ago!

Marc

Perhaps everyone should have complained. DAH!!
Marc you really are so....Forget I mentioned it.
The people at Cartoon Network won't!

James K.


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[hidden email] wrote:
> Tuned in to Big O on Cartoon Network to watch Big O and was
> surprised to see that they had a new opening. And guess what they
> are using Barry Gray's UFO theme for its theme music. I'm going
> over to Cartoon Network site and going to give them a few well
> choosen words. It one thing to use the theme music in bits and
> piece here in there but it another thing all thing to steal the
> theme outright without giving due credit to the master.
>
Are they 'stealing' the theme, or just reusing it? Do you think
they're using it without permission? To the Cartoon Network, and
to most of their viewers, it's just another piece of music. I
suspect most TV themes are played without a mention in the credits
to the composer.

Or is it being represented as someone else's work?

> Are they 'stealing' the theme, or just reusing it?

Also, strictly speaking, they are not "stealing" the UFO theme --
they are using a brand new piece of music which is just VERY
SIMILAR to the UFO theme. Just like Big O Season 1's theme
music was VERY SIMILAR to Queen's "Flash Gordon" theme.

Marc

Marc Martin wrote:
>
> Also, strictly speaking, they are not "stealing" the UFO theme --
> they are using a brand new piece of music which is just VERY
> SIMILAR to the UFO theme. Just like Big O Season 1's theme
> music was VERY SIMILAR to Queen's "Flash Gordon" theme.
>


Aha - well in that case, I can absolutely see James' point - openly
using an existing piece of music is one thing, but (without having
heard it, mind) unless it's acknowledged as being based on the UFO
theme, this smells a bit of plagiarism!

> Are they 'stealing' the theme, or just reusing it? Do you think
> they're using it without permission? To the Cartoon Network, and
> to most of their viewers, it's just another piece of music. I
> suspect most TV themes are played without a mention in the credits
> to the composer.
>
> Or is it being represented as someone else's work?

I just looked at the Big O soundtrack CD, and the credits make no mention
of Barry Gray (unless it's in Japanese and I just can't read it) or
Carlton. I can see that it says that all of the music is composed
by one person (which is all in Japanese), so it does appear that
someone is taking credit for someone else's basic composition. I
think in a court of law it would be judged that the UFO and the
Big O theme are sufficiently close to warrant some kind of penalty.

Marc

> Aha - well in that case, I can absolutely see James' point - openly
> using an existing piece of music is one thing, but (without having
> heard it, mind) unless it's acknowledged as being based on the UFO
> theme, this smells a bit of plagiarism!

You haven't heard it? I posted an MP3 of it a while back. Here it
is:

http://ufoseries.com/bigo.mp3

Marc

Other music in the series is credited but this isn't. In other things when
the music written by other people is used even if its just a small bit the
original writer is credited. I if you want an example of this take when in the
Bond Movie Moonraker Bond rides into the MI 6 HQ in South America dressed as a
Gaucho they play the theme from The Magnicient Seven(get the joke) which was
written by Elmer Bernstein. This is listed in the credits of the movie. They
also did the same thing in The Spy Who Loved Me when Bond is dressed in Arab
fashion and they play the theme from Lawrence of Arabia which was written by
Maurice Jarre who best score for it at the Oscars in 1962. The work was clearly
listed in the credits as the work of the orignial artist. Cartoon Network
using the UFO theme without doing so is just as much theft as people copying
video without paying royalties which you seem to get so bothered about James. So
why doen't this bother you?

James K.


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> listed in the credits as the work of the orignial artist. Cartoon Network
> using the UFO theme without doing so is just as much theft

So let me get one thing straight James -- on the Cartoon Network, did you
hear the EXACT performance of Barry Gray's UFO theme as it was performed in
1969 and heard on TV, or was it just the Big O theme song, which sounds very
similar to the UFO theme? Your posts make it sound like they are playing
the original Barry Gray performances...

Marc

Marc,
no they are not using the exact same note for note version of UFO as Barry
Gray did. But it is still the same piece of music. Playing a note softer or or
a piece of music in a different key does not Alter the fact that it is the
same piece of music any more than copying Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet line
for line but changing the characters names would make it someone elses play.

James K.


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It stinks to high Heaven when something like this happens. A similar
thing happened in the UK, when Channel 5 put out a really crappy quiz
show called Topranko, and used Dudley Simpson's classic theme from
The Tomorrow People as its own. Nowhere in the titles was he
credited, and the result will be that people will think the music has
been written for a cheap and tacky piece of trash and not the
original show for which it was intended. But then maybe the company
involved in using what seems to be the UFO music by Mr Gray is one of
thesebig companies that thinks the law doesn't apply to them and that
they can steal someone elses work!

--- In [hidden email], SumitonJD@a... wrote:
> Tuned in to Big O on Cartoon Network to watch Big O and was
surprised to see
> that they had a new opening. And guess what they are using Barry
Gray's UFO
> theme for its theme music. I'm going over to Cartoon Network site
and going to
> give them a few well choosen words. It one thing to use the theme
music in
> bits and piece here in there but it another thing all thing to
steal the theme
> outright without giving due credit to the master.
>
> James K.
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]