A sibling songwriting team is accusing Lizzo of stealing the most iconic line in her hit song Truth Hurts, which is the second plagiarism claim over the lyric in the last year. Brothers Justin and Jeremiah Raisens claim that the singer and her writing team used lyrics, chords, and melodies from an April 2017 writing session for a completely different song and ended up using them in Truth Hurts without giving them any credit.
Justin and Jeremiah Raisens spoke with The New York Times earlier this week and claimed that Lizzo’s line “I just took a DNA test turns out I’m 100 percent that b*tch” is something they saw on Twitter and it came from British singer Mina Lioness, who made the first claim of plagiarism against Lizzo in 2018.
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The Truth about “Truth Hurts” On April 11th, 2017, we wrote a song called “Healthy” w/ Lizzo, Jesse St John, and Yves Rothman at our studio. “I just took a DNA test turns out I’m 100% that bitch” was taken from “Healthy” and used in “Truth Hurts”. We were never contacted about being credited for the use of the parts of “Healthy” (melody, lyrics, and chords) that appear in “Truth Hurts”. After reaching out to Ricky Reed and Lizzo’s team about fixing it, we put the song in dispute in 2017 when it came out. We’ve tried to sort this out quietly for the last two years, only asking for 5% each but were shutdown every time. Coming forward publicly to family, friends, artists, and colleagues seems to be the only way at this point in relieving some of our emotional distress caused by this. The last thing we want to do is throw any negativity toward Lizzo’s momentum and movement as a cultural figure. If we believe in what she’s preaching, believing in ourselves & our own voices is something we thought she’d understand. Shout out to the singer Mina Lioness ( @minalioness ) for tweeting “I just did a DNA test turns out I’m 100% that bitch”. A meme of that came up in our writing session & inspired the lyric and melody we wrote together. If Ricky and Lizzo’s team decide to settle this dispute with us, we would like to share some of the proceeds with Mina for her influence on Healthy. The clip below shows a video & photos from the day we wrote “Healthy” along with the comparisons between the two works. All the Love, Justin & Jeremiah Raisen #lizzo #truthhurts #healthy
The songwriting duo say that they wrote a song called Healthy with Lizzo and her writing team that included Lioness’ now-famous line, but she and her writing team ditched the song and used their work in Truth Hurts without their permission.
“We were never contacted about being credited for the use of the parts of Healthy (melody, lyrics, and chords) that appear in Truth Hurts,” the brothers wrote in the caption of a video they posted to prove their claim. “We’ve tried to sort this out quietly for the last two years, only asking for 5% [songwriting royalties] each, but were shut down every time.”
Lizzo, AKA Melissa Jefferson, is credited with writing the chart-topping single along with Ricky Reed, Tele, and Jesse Saint John. In response, Lizzo’s lawyer Cynthia S. Arato said that the Raisens did not write Truth Hurts and they didn’t help write any of the material they are now trying to make a profit from.
Arato says that both Justin and Jeremiah “expressly renounced any claim to the work, in writing, months ago.”
In addition to their New York Times interview, the siblings also took to Instagram to show fans the details behind their claim with a side-by-side comparison of the two songs. They wrote in the caption that coming forward publicly seems to be the only way they are able to relieve some of their emotional distress caused by this situation.
The brothers say that the last thing they want to do is throw negativity toward “Lizzo’s momentum and movement as a cultural figure.” They added that they thought the singer would understand their actions because they believe in what she is preaching – believing in themselves and their voices.
Lizzo claims that she wrote the lyric – which was inspired by a viral meme – and she says she never saw Lioness’ tweet. This past summer, she attempted to copyright the phrase “100 percent that b*tch” for merchandising.
Lioness says that she can’t believe how brazen Lizzo and her team have been when it comes to ignoring her, but they know she can’t do anything about it because she doesn’t have the resources.
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Lizzo has not responded to the latest claims.
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