UPDATE 2: The videos from both NGHTMRE’s and Flux Pavilion’s Facebooks, as well as the video on YouTube, have been removed.
UPDATE: Shortly after the issue was brought to his attention, Flux Pavilion updated the credits on the Circus Records YouTube video with links to all artists’ pages. The Facebook video which has been up for nearly 24 hours and makes up the bulk of the video views is still only credited to director Rodney Lief.
NGHTMRE & Flux Pavilion’s long-awaited collaboration “Feel Your Love” was released yesterday to mass praise. The combination of both artists’ styles could not have come out in a more perfect union. Unfortunately, the release was marred slightly by the visual art accompanying it, directed by Rodney Lief. 
Shortly after the video’s release, visual artist kyttenjanae shared the post on her wall and accused Lief of stealing content from herself, as well as other visual artists like “Kidmograph, Hexeosis, Pi-Slices, Zolloc,Popsicle Illusion, Falcão Lucas, and more.”
In an email to kyttenjanae, Lief wrote,
“Just letting you know I do these videos for fun, there was no money exchanged for the Feel Your Love video.
The label was aware that I would be sampling/editing a collection of content from all over.
I don’t want to not create these edits, as my end product is always something entirely new than just a single piece of content sampled & it’s just something I really enjoy doing.
I’m currently working on a website/portfolio to house my edits, where I’ll be able to feature each video along with full attribution/link to the many pieces I sampled & the artists that produced them.”
There are a couple issues with his response. First, we’re sure that the label assumed that he would credit or at least have permission to sample and edit the videos of others, otherwise that’s just straight theft. Second, the fact that he’s “currently working” on a site that will eventually credit the artists that he takes content from doesn’t excuse his current actions.
NGHTMRE, the beacon of honesty and humility that he is, has already responded to fans about the situation and has begun reaching out to artists personally whose work was featured in the video. He’s offered to give due credit or remove the video entirely based on the responses from the artists.
While EDM stories about theft most commonly center around music, the theft of visuals is another parallel issue that deserves its own consideration. Most recently, Bassnectar and/or his team were accused of and sued for stealing visuals from artist Max Hattler.
At the time of publishing, the video is still live on Flux Pavilion’s page and has been viewed over 20,000 times.
photo by roho foto
