Songs that sound just like other songs (sampling doesn't count)

Madonna’s “Don’t Tell Me” has quite a lot in common (especially in the beginning) with Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Sweet Home Alabama”.

“She Hates Me” by Puddle of Mudd and “Summer Nights” from the Grease soundtrack.

The Coldplay song that is ubiquitous now – has a running piano break that sounds like the accordion or synclavier or whatever it is in Nirvana’s “Jesus Doesn’t Want Me for a Sunbeam” on their Unplugged album. That was good and vague. Oh, and the guitar in Alice in Chain’s “Heaven Beside You” sound like Steve Miller Band’s “Keep on Rockin’ Me Baby.”

Didn’t Queen sue because of that?

Nora Jones’ “Don’t Know Why” sounds a lot like The Beatles’ “Yesterday” to me. Another well known example is “Sweet Little Sixteen” by Chuck Berry and “Surfin’ USA” by the Beach Boys, but Brian Wilson credits Berry as the writer on the record label.

Bad, Bad Leroy Brown and You Don’t Mess Around With Jim, both by Jim Croce.

StG

The Offspring had a song which sounded almost exactly like Simon and Garfunkel’s Cecilia. I proved it to a friend by singing S&G’s lyrics…can’t remember the other song name though.

Pink’s first big single also had the exact same chords (at least during the chorus) as another song that was popular around that time - it was either Enrique Iglesias or Mark Anthony. I don’t know which.

By Poison, there’s Every Rose Has Its Thorns and Something To Believe In. You can sing one over the other.

And then there’s Whitney Houston – who has basically just two songs. The fast one and the slow one.

Well, I always thought that Vanilla Ice sampled that beat intentionally from Under Pressure. Intentionally or unintentionally, the guy was a yutz for doing that.

I always thought that the chording to Sweet Home Alabama and Werewolves of London sounded eerily alike, but that’s probably just me.

Also, the beginning of Journey’s When the Lights Go Down in the City and Stand By Me are so much alike if you’re not listening to the bass (even the lyrics) that I’ve unintentionally started singing one over the other.

“Ride On” by AC/DC sounds like “Jesus Just Left Chicago” by ZZ Top.

The guitar solo in KISS’ “She” is lifted almost note for note from the Doors “5 to1”.

I think the end of Rod Stewart’s “Maggie Mae” sounds like the beginning of The Who’s “Baba O’Reilley”.

And I don’t know who it was, but I heard some song on the radio with the exact same melody as L7’s “Pretend We’re Dead”.

Twist and Shout is extremely similar to La Bamba

Speaking of Chuck Berry, am I the only one who’s always thought Hail Hail Rock n’ Roll is the EXACT same song as No Particular Place To Go?

Beelzebubba, The opening chords of No Doubt’s Don’t Speak sound a lot like Aerosmith’s Dream On.

And good call, Linty Freshy on Sweet Home Alabama and Werewolves of London.

Stevie Nicks has always said that she wrote Stand Back “on top of” Prince’s Little Red Corvette; that she liked his chords so much she just reused them. As a thank-you, the little purple guy sang backing vocals for her on Stand Back.

Beelzebubba, The opening chords of No Doubt’s Don’t Speak sound a lot like Aerosmith’s Dream On.

And good call, Linty Freshy, on Sweet Home Alabama and Werewolves of London.

Stevie Nicks has always said that she wrote Stand Back “on top of” Prince’s Little Red Corvette; that she liked his chords so much she just reused them. As a thank-you, the little purple guy sang backing vocals for her on Stand Back.

Sublime’s Badfish

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4 Non Blondes’ What’s Goin’ On?


From Tom Petty’s To Find a Freind, “and the days went by, like paper in the wind”

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Bob Dylan’s Blowing in the Wind, “The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind”

Sing these two phrases to the same jingle:

God rest ye merry gentlemen, Let nothing you dismay.
Remeber Christ our Savior, was born on Christmas day.

So join us here each week my friend your sure to get a smile.
By seven stranded cast aways who are here on Gilligans isle.

“Lady Madonna” by the Beatles, and “What I Got” by Sublime

New Order’s Dreams Never End’s bass got modified (and improved, IMHO) into the Cure’s Inbetween Days, although other than that the songs aren’t very similar. Then, the opening acoustic guitar part of Inbetween Days found its way to the opening of Wilco’s Pot Kettle Black, in a frankly more blatant manner. But, again, aside from that guitar it sounds nothing like either of the two other songs.

Then there is also the main guitar part of the Clash’s Clash City Rockers, which is almost a verbatim recreation of the Who’s Can’t Explain. But the Clash are/were The Only Band That Matters, so they can get away with it.

And which Nirvana song is it that appropriates Killing Joke’s Eighties melody? Come As You Are? I’m drawing a blank here…

Yeah, it’s “Come As You Are”.