I want to say that I believe in truly original thought but I can read your mind and all of everything inspires me.

“There is no such thing as a new idea. It is impossible. We simply take a lot of old ideas and put them into a sort of mental kaleidoscope. We give them a turn and they make new and curious combinations. We keep on turning and making new combinations indefinitely; but they are the same old pieces of colored glass that have been in use through all the ages.”

Mark Twain.

I'll make the first one overtly explicit.

This isn't so much to debate "openly inspired" vs "professionally plagiarized" but have your say.

 

How about these?

"I'll Stand By You" by The Pretenders (1994)

"Estoy Aqui" by Soon-to-be-star Shakira (1995)

 

Massive attacks -teardrop

Emeli Sande - breathing underwater

Background music and vocals bits of verse ending

 

Even the titles. 'Estoy Aqui' literally translates to 'I'm Here'.

 

There was this almost-major-league band in the late '80s called Pop Will Eat Itself. Pop music is as good or "original" as the sources from which it derives influence. The broader the scope of influence, the richer the results. A lot of popular music is, and always had been, plagiarism, intentional or unconscious. Both composers and listeners of popular music are entrained to "hear" music in certain patterns and codes of familiarity. A lot of old "country" songs just sound like any one of five templates for songs; their melodies are easy not only to sing, but to predict - and were effective for keeping poor rural whites dumb and drunk.

The idea of "there are no origial ideas" and its variants might not itself be original, but it is too often used to justify plagiarism, musical laziness (before or after the fact of writing), artistic ineptitude or mediocrity, and the "copyleft," and the premise of anti-copyright or anti-intellectual-property-law wing of the open-source movement.