Accusers Want Trial in Bruno Mars Case

The company suing Miley Cyrus over claims that her “Flowers” ripped off Bruno Mars’ “When I Was Your Man” is fighting her effort to end the lawsuit, citing “undeniable similarities” between the two songs and writing in new court documents: “Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.”

In a Wednesday court filing obtained and first reported by Billboard, Tempo Music urges a federal judge to reject Cyrus’s recent motion to dismiss the case, which argued last month that the two tracks shared only “commonplace tropes in breakup songs” that cannot be owned by any songwriter.

Tempo says the similarities between the two songs actually go much deeper than that, and that they were immediately noticed by many fans and critics.

“As soon as ‘Flowers’ … hit the airwaves, pop culture headlines were abuzz with speculation about its relationship to ‘Man’,” writes Alex M. Weingarten, Tempo’s lead attorney. “The music industry and fans of pop music were not the only ones to spot the undeniable similarities [and] their highly similar lyrical and musical material has been the subject of extensive expert testimony.”

“Simply put,” Weingarten adds, “where there’s smoke, there’s fire.”

 “Flowers,” which spent eight weeks atop the Billboard Hot 100 after it was released in January 2023, was immediately seen by many fans as an “answer song” to “Man,” which itself had reached the top of the chart in 2012. According to internet sleuths, Cyrus had no gripe with Mars but instead with her ex-husband, Liam Hemsworth, who had supposedly once dedicated “Man” to her.

Tempo (formally Tempo Secured Music Rights Collateral) sued in September 2024, claiming “Flowers” had lifted numerous elements beyond the clap-back lyrics, including “melodic and harmonic material,” “pitch ending pattern,” and “bass-line structure.” Mars himself is not involved in the case; Tempo was able to sue because it bought the copyrights of his “Man” co-writer Philip Lawrence.

Seeking to end Tempo’s case, Cyrus’ lawyers argued last month that the only actual similarities are the seemingly call-and-response lyrics, such as his “I should’ve bought you flowers” and her “I can buy myself flowers.” And they said those were just common phrases you might hear in any song about a failed relationship, not evidence of infringement: “No one owns these words, which are commonplace tropes in breakup songs,” they wrote.

But in Wednesday’s response, Tempo’s lawyers say they aren’t suing over “any one phrase alone,” but over the entire arrangement of lyrics in Bruno’s chorus — something they say is very clearly protected by copyright law. “Courts have found lyrics protectable based on far less,” they wrote. And at the very least, they say the issue is too close to be decided without a jury trial.

Tempo’s attorneys also sharply deny Cyrus’ alternative defense: That “Flowers” is shielded by copyright’s fair use doctrine because it could be seen as criticizing Mars’ song. They call that defense “seemingly contradictory,” since Cyrus has insisted that she was not riffing on Mars’ song, and also “meritless” as a legal argument.

“The reality is ‘Flowers’ is just plain theft,” Weingarten writes. “It took a character from ‘Man’ and had her recite the same experience using the same key words for the same commercial purpose.”