Pop star Madonna accused of 'stealing'… again

Pop star Madonna may be making waves for her new fashion line, but one clothing company says she’s ripped them off.

LA Triumph, Inc claims in a new lawsuit it's been marketing "Material Girl" clothing since 1997, selling garments with millions of dollars under its trademark, celebrity website TMZ.com reports.

The company reportedly wants a declaration from a federal US judge that Madonna's use of "Material Girl" creates “deception” in the marketplace.

And of course, the company also wants the judge to order Madonna and her company to hand over all of the profits they have made from their clothing line.

TMZ said Madonna’s representative has yet to comment.

Over the course of her 25-year career, Madonna has often been accused of stealing, whether lyrics, musical hooks, ideas or looks.

Her “Material Girl” video famously channels Marilyn Monroe’s song “Diamonds are a girl’s best friend” from the movie, “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes”, while her 1989 video for "Express Yourself" referenced the Fritz Lang’s 1927 film “Metropolis”.

Debbie Harry

Blondie singer Debbie Harry was one of those who has accused Madonna of stealing her look in the eighties, alleging at the time that the “Like A Virgin” singer got the idea for her platinum blonde hairdo from her. She said in 2007: “I came right up against the Madonna thing. Maybe it's my paranoia but she had a lot of my looks. If you look closely, sometimes there's pictures of her and me that completely overlap.”

The media has also spotlighted how she has been inspired by Kylie Minogue several times, most notably on the covers of her albums “American Life” (similar to an old Kylie poster casting the singer as a latter-day Che Guevara) and 2008’s “Hard Candy” (similar to Kylie’s 2007 album cover “X”).

The pop icon has been accused of plagiarism from almost the very start of her career. The Philadelphia band Hide the Babies says Madonna stole a lyric and concept of theirs for her breakthrough “Like a Virgin” hit, apparently changing up the line: “I'm not a virgin/but you're the first one...” The band has said it handed Madonna’s mangement a cassette with their song in the hopes of a production deal, but the tape was returned six months later, shortly before her song was released. “Then when her tune came out we couldn't do ours anymore because everybody thought we got it from her,” the band say on the website of their frontwoman, Kitty Brazelton.

And Jamaican R&B singer Aisha accuses Madonna of repeatedly stealing her ideas and music on her website, particularly for the songs “Incredible” and “She’s Not Me” on the 2008 album “Hard Candy”.

But for all these people, who are spectacularly less successful than the pop icon, it remains to be seen whether there’s any truth to their allegations or whether these are merely attempts to propel themselves into the spotlight.