Pink Floyd’s song “One of These Days” has a few bars of the Doctor Who theme in it.
The European pop band Edelweiss’s “Bring Me Edelweiss” takes the tune of Abba’s “S.O.S.”
Guns n Roses’s “Civil Wars” has the tune of “When Johnny comes marching Home” in it.
Primus’s song “The Air is Getting Slippery” references Pink Floyd’s album Animals, presumably the song “Pigs on the Wing”
That’s all I got for now.
A Praise Chorus by Jimmy Eat World has about a half-dozen references packed into one verse:
Crimson and clover, over and over
Crimson and clover, over and over
Our house in the middle of our street
Why did we ever meet?
Started in my rock and roll fantasy
Don’t don’t, don’t let’s start
Why did we ever part?
Kickstart my rock and rollin’ heart
(And on preview, I see Snooooopy already mentioned this one…ah well.)
Harry Nilsson’s “You Can’t Do That” was, of course, a Beatles song originally. However, he put quotes from around 20 other Beatles songs in the background.
Sly and the Family Stone’s, “Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)” has a chorus that quotes from titles of earlier Sly and the Family Stone songs.
Beyoncé’s “Halo” and Clarkson’s “Already Gone”
Not exactly a “steal” since the guy who created the track simply sold it to both.
Mariah Carey’s “Fantasy” quotes Tom Tom Club’s “Genius of Love” as well as sampling it. Ice Cube quoted it in “Bop Gun” as well.
Sting does this a lot. The end of “Oh God” is a piece of “Every Little Thing She Does is Magic.” The end of “Love is the Seventh Wave” quotes “Every Breath You Take.”
Hootie & The Blowfish quoted Bob Dylan’s “Idiot Wind” and mentioned other Dylan songs in “Only Wanna Be With You” and promptly got sued for it.
Life on Mars? - David Bowie: “Mickey Mouse has grown up a cow, and Lennon’s on sale again.”
Everything Zen - Bush: “Minnie Mouse has grown up a cow; Dave’s on sale again.”
Bush also may or may not have directly lifted “Try to see it once my way” from Alice in Chains’ song, Would?, for that same song. I had heard it was deliberate, perhaps not.
(Missed the window)
Red Hot Chili Peppers Californication:
Space may be the final frontier - Star Trek
But it?s made in a Hollywood basement
And Cobain can you hear the spheres - Kurt Cobain
Singing songs off station to station - Station to Station is a Bowie album
And Alderon?s not far away - Alderaan is a planet in Star Wars
It?s Californication - which is the stupidest name for a song, ever.
It also has the same chords as My Way.
Speaking of Bowie, the Bangles’ song “The Glitter Years” quotes his “Better hang on to yourself.”
Some other Barenaked Ladies examples also come to mind.
“Straw Hat & Dirty Old Hank” contains a few lyrics to Anne Murray songs (can’t remember which ones). The song is basically about a stalker and was inspired by a stalker Anne Murray had once.
Also, “Grade 9” has the piano riff from Vince Guaradli’s “Charlie Brown Theme” as well as some of Rush’s “Tom Sawyer.”
Oh yeah, and “King of Bedside Manor” breaks into Styx’s “Mr. Roboto” near the end.
April Wine’s I Like to Rock has the guitar riffs from both Satisfaction and DayTripper playing over each other at the end.
Early Led Zeppelin has lots of lines stolen from Robert Johnson; I’m thinking particularly of the “squeeze my lemons till the juice runs down my leg” line.
Even more so than that, if you listen to ‘How Sweet to be an idiot’ by Neil Innes, knowing what Oasis’s Whatever sounds like, it is quite a shock. Its the same song different lyrics…
“It’s Ice” by Phish uses “Yakety Sax” (the Benny Hill show theme) as a bass line.
Great example, and it’s amazing how well these two riffs blend together.
To be fair, “I Feel Fine” bears a not-coincidental resemblance to “Watch Your Step” by Bobby Parker.
The bridge of John’s “Sexy Sadie” on the White Album deliberately copies the chords from the verse of Paul’s “Here There and Everywhere.”
And one more Beatles example: “Sun King” was acknowledged by the Fabs as an out-and-out ripoff of Fleetwood Mac’s “Albatross.”
Many of Bob Dylan’s songs are reworkings of traditional folk songs: “Blowin’ in the Wind” came from a spiritual called “No More Auction Block,” while “A Hard Rain’s a’Gonna Fall” comes from “Lord Ronald.”
Talking Heads and Counting Crows both wrote songs called “Mr. Jones,” in reference to the protagonist/victim in Bob Dylan’s “Ballad of a Thin Man.”
Gillian Welch’s “Revelator” has a verse that almost-but-not-quite quotes Dylan’s “Desolation Row.”
Two from the Pogues’ last album, “Hell’s Ditch”: one song starts by playing the intro to the Beach Boys’ “You Still Believe in Me” (but with Irish instruments), while another song’s lyric steals a line from Bo Diddley’s “Who do you Love?”.
Oh, someone mentioned “Sexy Sadie”… the author of the 33 1/3-series booklet on “OK Computer” noticed how Radiohead borrowed (not necessarily consciously) the key chord sequence from that song’s verse for the verse of “Karma Police”. I never noticed the “Here, There…” thing, though – good catch. For all their differences in style, John really appreciated Paul’s creativity most of the time (and vice versa) – John specifically referred (not sarcastically) to “H, T…” as one of Paul’s “masterpieces” in a 1970 interview.
It’s kind of hard to pin it down - but, “I Want You” by Elvis Costello from “I Want You” by the Beatles.
Musically very similar, especially the coda, same choppy/smooth loud/soft dynamic, repetition etc.
Like I said, hard to pin down, but EC was very clearly “inspired” by the Beatles, although the lyrics are all his.
Please explain the difference between songs that “have lines from other songs sung in the same style as the original” vs “samples”?
A sample is a snippet of the original recording.