Mark Ronson gave out Uptown Funk credits to prevent legal drama

Mark Ronson's smash hit Uptown Funk now boasts 11 songwriters after the producer gave out credits to members of disco group The Gap Band in the aftermath of the Blurred Lines copyright case.

Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams were ordered to pay $7.3 million to Marvin Gaye's children earlier this year (15) after a judge ruled they had copied portions of his hit Got to Give It Up in their chart-topping single Blurred Lines.

In the wake of the ruling, five new songwriters were added to Ronson and Bruno Mars' track in April (15), five months after its release. Charlie, Robert and Ronnie Wilson plus Rudolph Taylor and Lonnie Simmons, writers of The Gap Band's 1979 Oops Upside Your Head, were added to the Uptown Funk listing amid reports of a potential legal battle over similarities between the two songs.

Ronson has now declared he did not copy portions of The Gap Band's track, but admits the changes were made to avoid any potential legal wrangling.

He tells Britain's Daily Telegraph newspaper, "There's nothing we intentionally or unintentionally took from that song, but that was the settlement we were told to follow... after the Blurred Lines thing, everybody was like, 'You better be careful', and that's kind of all I wanna say about it.

"Basically, anybody who has a hit is opened up to being sued anyway. There are only so many rhythmic notations, only so many chord sequences, only so many notes. You'll just have the musical equivalent of ambulance-chasers analysing songs for potential law suits. So that's obviously a drag. I don't think people want to see music halted by artists so worried about being sued that they censor themselves."

The five new credits brings the songwriting total to 11.