Miley Cyrus is facing a lawsuit for alleged copyright infringement regarding her popular 2023 single “Flowers.” The lawsuit has been filed by Tempo Music Investments, a company that claims to hold part of the copyright for Bruno Mars’s hit “When I Was Your Man.”
“Flowers,” which serves as the lead single from Cyrus’s eighth studio album, Endless Summer Vacation, has achieved significant success, dominating global charts and earning two Grammy Awards at the 2024 ceremony for Record of the Year and Best Pop Solo Performance. The track also received a nomination for Song of the Year.
“When I Was Your Man,” released in 2012, was a chart-topping hit in the US and garnered a Grammy nomination for Best Pop Solo Performance.
According to reports, the lawsuit asserts that Cyrus’s song copies chord progressions and shares some lyrics with Mars’s ballad, along with claiming notable similarities in melody, harmony, and chorus. Court documents allegedly state, “It is undeniable based on the combination and number of similarities between the two recordings that ‘Flowers’ would not exist without ‘When I Was Your Man.’”
Tempo Music is seeking unspecified damages and is requesting that Cyrus be prevented from distributing “Flowers” or performing the song live. Notably, Bruno Mars is not a plaintiff in the lawsuit.
Cyrus’s and Mars’s representatives have been contacted for comments regarding the situation.
In 2019, Variety reported that Warner Music Group and Providence Equity Partners planned to invest $650 million into recorded music and music publishing catalogs through the then-new Tempo Music Investments platform. Three years later, Billboard reported that Mars had sold part of his catalog to Warner Chappell Music, a subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Upon the release of “Flowers,” fans noticed apparent similarities to “When I Was Your Man,” which was rumored to have been dedicated to Cyrus by her ex-husband, actor Liam Hemsworth. In Cyrus’s lyrics, she appears to transform the message of Mars’s song: “I should’ve bought you flowers/ And held your hand/ Should’ve gave you all my hours/ When I had the chance/ Take you to every party/ ‘Cause all you wanted to do was dance/ Now my baby’s dancing/ But she’s dancing with another man.”
The chorus of “Flowers” features lines such as: “I can buy myself flowers/ Write my name in the sand/ Talk to myself for hours/ Say things you don’t understand/ I can take myself dancing/ And I can hold my own hand/ Yeah, I can love me better than you can.”
Fans have also pointed out that Cyrus’s chorus seems to mirror the melody of Mars’s song. Cyrus is credited as a co-writer of “Flowers” alongside songwriter and producer Aldae (Gregory Hein) and songwriter/producer Michael Pollack, while “When I Was Your Man” was penned by Mars, Philip Lawrence, Ari Levine, and Andrew Wyatt.