The official music video for “Dame Tu Cosita,” a lively Spanish reggaeton song by Panamanian artist El Chombo, featuring Jamaican dancehall veteran Cutty Ranks has surpassed 4.4. billion streams on YouTube. The music video is animated by ArtNoux and directed by Sihem OUILLANI.
A hit among the Gen Z streamers, the video showcases a green extra-terrestrial figure dancing with its arms extended in a reddish, rocky habitat, enclosed by a square outline. El Chombo’s name is elegantly written in cursive in the bottom half of the square, followed by the title “Dame Tu Cosita.”
Originally recorded in 1997 as a short version titled “Introduccion B (El Cosita Mix)” on El Chombo’s album “Cuentos de la Cripta II,” the song gained popularity on the internet at the dawn of the streaming era.
The song is YouTube’s 6th most streamed music video of all time earning 700,000 views per day. It is the most streamed song featuring a Jamaican on the platform.
In 2018, French record label Juston Records signed El Chombo and commissioned an extended version of the track, which also involved acquiring the rights to ArtNoux’s video and creating a new video for the extended song.
Ultra Music acquired the distribution rights to the new version and released the music video on their YouTube channel in April 2018. The song quickly climbed the charts, debuting at No. 81 on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at No. 36.
A remix of the song, featuring Pitbull and Karol G, was later released on August 24, 2018, and produced by El Chombo and Afro Bros. This remix also enjoyed chart success, reaching No. 1 on the Billboard Bubbling Under Hot 100 chart and No. 31 on the Billboard Argentina Hot 100.
The song is the subject of a copyright infringement lawsuit which accuses producer El Chombo, real name Rodney Sebastian Clark Donalds and over 150 defendants, of infringing on a single 1989 dancehall riddim called “Fish Market,” which allegedly serves as the basis for the “dembow” rhythm used in countless reggaeton tracks.
The plaintiffs, Cleveland “Clevie” Browne and Wycliffe “Steely” Johnson, claim that their song has been sampled or interpolated in over 1,800 songs since its release, amounting to acts of copyright infringement.
The lawsuit, initially filed in 2021, includes a wide array of defendants, ranging from “Despacito” stars Daddy Yankee, Luis Fonsi, and Justin Bieber to artists like Bad Bunny, Anitta, Pitbull, Karol G, Ricky Martin, and El Chombo. Units of all three major music companies Universal Music Group, Sony Music Group, Warner Music et al are bankrolling the top Intellectual property Attorneys at Pryor Cashman to fight the case according to documents obtained by World Music Views.
The accused artists’ legal team, representing 89 of the defendants, criticize the size and complexity of the lawsuit, describing it as a procedural disaster that fails to provide specific allegations against each defendant, leaving them unaware of the exact nature of the accusations and the works in question. Consequently, they argue that Clevie & Steely have failed to meet the fundamental elements of a copyright infringement claim.
While the U.S. Supreme Court has stated that copyright cases can typically be filed even decades later, the attorneys argue that Clevie & Steely’s case pushes the boundaries of the system, as the plaintiffs did not take any action or register copyrights until 2020, as first reported by WMV.
