After rapper, producer and Black Eyed Pea Will.i.am was accused of plagiarising his song “Let’s Go” off of DJ Arty and Matt Zo, he came clean this week and admitted to infringing copyright. In his defense… he really liked the track.

In an interview with KISS FM, will.i.am. said that it was all a big mistake. He had originally recorded his own version of Rebound for use in the new song. “But in a year’s time, time’s gone by [and] we preferred writing over and using the [original] Rebound,” he said. “Something happened and the clearance… hopefully we resolved the issue.” Well that’s unfortunate.

“LOL what?” exclaimed Arty on Twitter last week when he saw the track on YouTube. “They never cleared rights through Anjunabeats, who’s only one label, who ownes [sic] the rights for ‘Rebound’.”

The odd thing is, there is usually an entire legal team to make sure this kind of thing doesn’t happen. Apparently things have been kicked into gear on that front, with will.i.am. now saying that he has now contacted the rights owners and that a deal is being negotiated. This isn’t the first time will.i.am. has been involved in a copyright debacle though. Most notably, he has been accused of plagiarising the Black Eyed Peas track “Shut Up,” from funk singer George Clinton and borrowing from Chicago singer Phoenix Phenom for “Boom Boom Pow.” In this case though, it sounds like will.i.am. feels justified in his actions: “I’m a fan of Arty. I think he’s great and the world needs to know about how talented those guys are,” he told KISS FM. “It’s sad that it’s turned into a fiasco, but hopefully it’s resolved, because I’m a fan of those guys to the point where I wrote to their instrumental.”

will.i.am, BBC Radio
This isn't the first time will.i.am has been accused of copyright infringement.