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Kelly Clarkson unwittingly covers Tokio Hotel

By Andy Malt | Published on Monday 2 March 2015

Kelly Clarkson has released a cover of a Tokio Hotel song. Which, it turns out, is news to her.

Clarkson released ‘Run, Run, Run’, a collaboration with John Legend taken from her new album ‘Piece By Piece’, last week. She seemingly believed it to be the only commercially available version of the track, written by Joacim Persson, Ry Cuming and David Jost.

Then Tokio Hotel tweeted: “Check out the cover version of our song ‘Run, Run, Run’ from the talented Kelly Clarkson and John Legend. So flattered!”

Flattered, they were. Flattered. Flattered because, as far as they see it, it is their song. In fact, the Tokio Hotel recording, which appeared on their 2014 album ‘Kings Of Suburbia’, lists the band’s Bill Kaulitz and Tom Kaulitz as co-songwriters. However, their names are not attached to Clarkson’s recording. So, does this mean we’ve got one of those legal battles we all enjoy so much on our hands? Sadly not. It seems both tracks are working from the same source material, rather than one being a straight cover of the other.

Clearing matters up, Clarkson wrote on Twitter: “Wow, just heard Tokio Hotel’s version of ‘Run, Run, Run’! So great! Had never heard that before! Some fans brought this to my attention. Only version I’ve ever heard of ‘Run, Run, Run’ was a piano/vocal by one of the writers that was sent to me two years ago. Well, there’s two versions of a great song! Also, [the Kaulitzes] weren’t included as writers of the song because I guess they didn’t write it, according to publishers. Not trying to disrespect them. It’s a bummer that I wasn’t given all the information and that it looks like I’m ripping them off because I would never do that to any artist”.

But which version is best? Well, there’s only one way to find out! Listen to both and form an opinion based on you own personal tastes.

Tokio Hotel

Kelly Clarkson