Bad Bunny wins key court battle over dembow rhythm: ruling affects nearly 2,000 songs
A U.S. federal court in Los Angeles has issued a ruling that significantly changes the direction of one of the largest copyright disputes in contemporary Latin music. On September 1, 2026, Judge André Birotte Jr. granted a motion for reconsideration filed by Rimas Music and Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, known as Bad Bunny, and concluded that the plaintiffs cannot proceed with their broadest theory, according to which a certain combination of elements of the dembow rhythm constitutes a protected copyrighted work. The ruling concerns a dispute in which Cleveland “Clevie” Browne, the company Steely and Clevie Productions, and other plaintiffs alleged that hundreds of artists, producers, and record labels had used musical elements associated with the 1989 composition “Fish Market” without authorization. According to court documents and reports from U.S. media, over the years the proceedings encompassed more than 150 artists and approximately 1,800 to nearly 2,000 songs, including works by Bad Bunny, Daddy Yankee, Karol G, J Balvin, Drake, Luis Fonsi, and other globally known artists. The latest ruling does not end the entire case, but it removes its broadest and potentially most expensive copyright theory.
Judge reversed earlier ruling after request by Bad Bunny and Rimas
The key reversal came only two months after the same judge had determined that certain questions of originality and copyright protection should be decided by a jury. In a July 1, 2026 ruling, Birotte denied both sides’ motions for partial summary judgment, stating that serious disputes existed among music experts regarding which elements are found in the relevant works, how original they are, and whether together they can constitute a protected selection and arrangement of musical elements. At that time, the court concluded that such a “battle of the experts” could not be resolved at the summary judgment stage and that the facts should be evaluated by a juror or jury.
Rimas Music and Bad Bunny then requested reconsideration of that ruling on July 15. Their argument was not merely that individual rhythmic elements were too common to be protected, but that the plaintiffs had a more serious, threshold problem: they had not precisely identified a single specific copyrighted work containing the entire combination of elements for which they sought protection. The court heard oral arguments on August 14 and accepted that objection in early September. In the official ruling, Birotte stated that, after further review of the record, he concluded that the plaintiffs had not clearly identified a copyrighted work containing the allegedly protected selection and arrangement they sought to enforce legally.
This is important because U.S. copyright law can protect an original selection and arrangement of elements even when the individual elements themselves are not protected. However, the court emphasized that such a combination must be embodied in a specific work. According to the ruling, it is not sufficient during litigation to take rhythmic or instrumental portions from several different recordings, combine them into one abstract whole, and then claim that this reconstructed whole is itself the subject of copyright protection. Birotte emphasized that the court was not ruling that dembow as a rhythm is necessarily unprotected, nor that individual musical elements can never be original, but rather that the theory presented before him cannot survive without a clearly identified work containing the entire disputed arrangement.
“Fish Market”, “Dem Bow” and “Pounder” at the center of a years-long dispute
The dispute dates back to 2021, when Cleveland “Clevie” Browne and individuals connected with the estate of his longtime collaborator Wycliffe “Steely” Johnson initiated proceedings against a large number of artists, songwriters, producers, and music companies. The plaintiffs alleged that their instrumental recording “Fish Market”, created in 1989, contains key rhythmic and instrumental elements that were later carried into other works, including Shabba Ranks’ “Dem Bow” as well as “Pounder” and “Pounder (Dub Mix II)”. At various stages of the proceedings, those elements were described through combinations of percussion, programmed kick, snare, hi-hat, tambourines, synthesized toms, timbales, and a bass line.
In the court record, “Fish Market” occupies a central place because the plaintiffs claim that it marks the beginning of a chain of musical derivatives that, decades later, became a recognizable part of reggaeton. Dembow is the term now used for a characteristic syncopated rhythmic pattern whose historical development is associated with Jamaican dancehall, Panamanian reggae en español, and the Puerto Rican underground scene from which modern reggaeton emerged during the 1990s. Music historians and experts have for decades described this development as a transnational process in which rhythms, production techniques, samples, and variations traveled between Jamaica, Panama, New York, and Puerto Rico.
It was precisely this complex history that complicated the legal issue. The plaintiffs did not merely claim that certain newer songs directly copied a particular recording, but also that they adopted a recognizable arrangement of musical elements which, according to their theory, can be traced from “Fish Market” through later derivative versions. The defense, by contrast, argued that the disputed combination is not found in its entirety in any single work owned by the plaintiffs and that the lawsuit relies on a whole assembled after the fact. In September, that argument became decisive.
Why the court concluded that the plaintiffs’ theory cannot go before a jury
In its September 1 ruling, the court relied on U.S. precedent under which copyright protects concrete original expression, not a general idea, style, or an after-the-fact collection of similarities. Birotte specifically cited the precedent of the federal appeals court in the case connected with the song “Stairway to Heaven”, in which the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected an attempt to treat scattered similarities from different parts of music as a single protected combination. According to the new ruling, the same logic applies here: before a jury evaluates originality, similarity, or alleged copying, there must be a clearly defined copyrighted subject matter against which the accused works are compared.
The court record shows that the problem lay precisely in defining that subject matter. The plaintiffs hold rights to the composition and recording of “Fish Market”, to the composition “Dem Bow”, and to the recording of “Pounder (Dub Mix II)”, but not to the composition of the latter work, the court stated. Birotte concluded that the record does not show that the two-bar transcription that became the central piece of evidence in the dispute, namely the complete selection and arrangement of elements the plaintiffs seek to protect, appears as a unified whole in one of those copyrighted works.
The court further emphasized that the definition of the allegedly protected work cannot change during litigation. In August, according to the ruling, the plaintiffs argued more firmly that the entire two-bar pattern is contained in “Fish Market”, while earlier filings and hearings relied more broadly on “Dem Bow” and “Pounder (Dub Mix II)” to explain individual elements. Birotte did not conclude that such a claim was itself factually incorrect, but rather that the way the legal subject matter was defined throughout the proceedings showed that this was not merely a dispute between experts over musical analysis, but also a fundamental question about what exactly the allegedly protected work is. According to the court, that is a legal question that must be clarified before any jury assessment.
Ruling reaches far beyond Bad Bunny
Although the motion for reconsideration formally came from Bad Bunny and Rimas, the effect of the ruling is significantly broader. The court also granted requests from other groups of defendants to join the argument, including entities associated with Drake and OVO Sound, UMG Recordings, Empire Distribution, Maybach Music Group, Rich Music, Cinq Music Group, and other artists or companies. Media reports about the overall dispute have also for years listed Daddy Yankee, J Balvin, Karol G, Luis Fonsi, Pitbull, Justin Bieber, Rauw Alejandro, Don Omar, Wisin & Yandel, Anitta, Rosalía, and others among the defendants.
The scope of the case changed as various lawsuits were consolidated and filings were supplemented, so different figures appear in public sources. Earlier court documents referred to more than one hundred defendants, while more recent reports cited more than 150 artists and other related individuals. The number of songs has likewise been described at different stages as more than 1,000, around 1,800, or nearly 2,000. It is therefore more accurate to speak of approximately 1,800 to nearly 2,000 works rather than one fixed figure.
Among the songs mentioned in reports and filings in connection with the dispute are major global hits such as “Despacito”, as well as Bad Bunny songs including “Tití Me Preguntó”. It is important, however, to distinguish between the fact that a work was named in an extensive lawsuit and a judicial finding that the work actually infringed copyright. The latest ruling specifically reduces the possibility that a large number of such songs can be targeted on the basis of a single broad theory concerning a shared rhythmic arrangement.
What remains unresolved in the proceedings
The ruling is not a complete dismissal of the entire lawsuit or a final judgment on all of Steely & Clevie’s allegations. The court expressly stated that other issues and claims remain, particularly those concerning alleged direct use or sampling of specific sound recordings. Such claims are legally narrower in scope because they are not based on the idea that an enormous group of songs shares the same protected compositional arrangement, but on whether a specific recording was actually physically or digitally taken and used without appropriate authorization.
According to the ruling, within 30 days of September 1 the parties must meet and agree on a schedule for resolving the remaining issues. They then have an additional 15 days to submit a joint case-management plan or separate proposals if they fail to reach an agreement. At the same time, the court denied the defense’s alternative request to certify the earlier ruling for an immediate appeal to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals because it had already resolved the reconsideration in favor of the Rimas defendants.
This means that the dispute continues, but in a significantly narrower form. The most important part of the lawsuit — the claim that a large number of reggaeton songs can be considered infringements of one protected combination of dembow elements — can no longer proceed to trial in the form in which it was presented. The potential financial and creative impact has therefore been substantially reduced, although the final consequences for individual songs involving alleged direct samples remain to be determined.
Why the case matters to the entire music industry
The dispute has attracted extraordinary attention because it sits at the boundary between protecting specific authorial creativity and preserving common musical building blocks used by entire genres. U.S. courts have for years dealt with similar dilemmas in cases concerning melodies, harmonic progressions, grooves, rhythmic patterns, and combinations of seemingly unprotectable elements. After the controversial “Blurred Lines” case, in which Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams lost their dispute with Marvin Gaye’s estate, the music industry became particularly sensitive to rulings that could expand the scope of what is considered copyright-protected musical expression.
In this case, the court did not establish a general rule that rhythm can never be protected. On the contrary, in earlier stages of the proceedings Birotte declined to conclude that the rhythmic elements of “Fish Market” were automatically outside the reach of copyright law, considering evidence and expert analysis necessary for such an assessment. The latest ruling likewise carefully avoids answering whether the disputed elements, individually or together, are original. The ruling is narrower: the plaintiffs must first identify one specific work in which the allegedly protected selection and arrangement is actually embodied.
Such an approach is also important for other genres that rely on recognizable patterns and traditions of reuse. In hip-hop, dancehall, reggaeton, blues, electronic music, and many other styles, creativity often arises through variations of already familiar rhythms, production techniques, or short musical phrases. Overly broad rights in such fundamental elements could increase licensing costs and restrict the creation of new works, while overly narrow protection may leave original creators without compensation when their specific work is actually copied. For that reason, future steps in this case will also be important, particularly where the dispute is reduced to direct samples, in which the connection between the original and newer recording is much more concrete.
A defense victory, but not a final ruling on the history of dembow
The latest court ruling delivers a major legal victory to Bad Bunny and numerous other artists, but it does not resolve the broader historical debate over the origins of dembow or the issue of cultural recognition for Jamaican producers in the development of reggaeton. Music researchers have long documented the strong influence of Jamaican dancehall, the song “Dem Bow”, and later variations of the rhythm on the Panamanian and Puerto Rican scenes. The court proceedings address the narrower question of legal protection for specific works, not who culturally or historically “owns” an entire musical style.
For now, the legal effect is clear. On September 1, 2026, the court withdrew the portion of its July ruling that had denied summary judgment in favor of the defendants and has now granted partial summary judgment against the theory of a protected selection and arrangement. This prevents a jury, under the theory as currently framed, from deciding whether an enormous group of songs infringed copyright in a combination of dembow elements. The remaining portion of the case will focus on narrower issues, and the next procedural steps will depend on the schedule the parties propose to the federal court in Los Angeles.
Sources:
- U.S. District Court, Central District of California – September 1, 2026 ruling granting Rimas Music and Bad Bunny’s motion for reconsideration and granting partial summary judgment (link)
- Loeb & Loeb – legal summary and documentation of the July 1, 2026 ruling concerning competing expert analyses, originality, and copyright protection (link)
- Music Business Worldwide – overview of the latest ruling, scope of the proceedings, and remaining claims after reconsideration (link)
- USA TODAY / AOL – report on the ruling, scope of the lawsuit, and arguments by Bad Bunny’s legal team (link)
- Courthouse News Service – earlier course of the dispute, origin of the claims surrounding “Fish Market”, “Dem Bow”, and “Pounder”, and the ruling on motions to dismiss (link)
- Pitchfork – historical and musical-cultural context of the development of the dembow rhythm and reggaeton, as well as an earlier overview of the legal implications of the dispute (link)