Ralf Hütter heard something in 1997 that he thought had been stolen from him somewhere in the Kling Klang studio in Düsseldorf, a place that smelled of circuitry and cold precision, where Kraftwerk created some of the most influential electronic music of the twentieth century, mostly by treating machines as instruments and silence as composition. It lasted for two seconds. A hip-hop song by a young German rapper named Sabrina Setlur featured a slightly slowed and looped drum beat from the 1977 song Metall auf Metall. Moses Pelham was the producer. He hadn’t requested authorization.

By all accounts, what transpired is among the most remarkable legal sagas in recorded music history. Twenty-seven years, two visits to the European Union’s Court of Justice, five distinct cases at Germany’s Federal Court, three appeals at the Hanseatic Higher Regional Court, and two rounds at the Federal Constitutional Court. Everything. Sound for more than two seconds. In April 2026, the case finally reached what seems to be its final significant chapter when the CJEU rendered a decision that, for the first time in legally binding European law, defined what “pastiche” actually means. By doing so, Moses Pelham won a victory with far-reaching consequences.

Setlur’s 1997 song Nur Mir, which roughly translates to “Only Me,” contains the sample in question. It’s a good song; it’s atmospheric, fast-paced, and has that special quality that comes from well-executed sampling when the borrowed element blends in so well that you can’t quite picture the song without it. Pelham used the Kraftwerk rhythm as the basis for the song, lowering the tempo a little and looping it. He hadn’t given it credit. It wasn’t licensed by him. When Hütter filed a lawsuit in 1999, the music industry was genuinely intrigued by the case’s central question: where does borrowing end and theft begin? Since hip-hop producers began creating whole sonic architectures from pre-existing recordings in the 1980s, the industry has struggled with this issue.

Two Seconds, Thirty Years: The Kraftwerk Moses Pelham Lawsuit That Finally Changed European Music Law

The case went through cycles of rulings and reversals in German courts. Pelham won a 2016 ruling. In 2019, the CJEU overturned it, ruling that samples need authorization unless they are truly unrecognizable in the new work. The German courts subsequently found that the Kraftwerk rhythm was identifiable; however, by this time, “pastiche” had become a legitimate defense under German copyright law, and the Federal Court remanded the case to the CJEU for a precise definition.

That definition was given in the April 2026 ruling. According to the court, pastiche refers to artistic creations that engage in what it referred to as a “artistic or creative dialogue” with one or more preexisting works while remaining distinctly different. This conversation can take many different forms, including critical engagement, satirical commentary, tribute, and stylistic imitation. A person who is familiar with the original must be able to identify the connection to the source material. The court determined that the sample in Nur Mir qualified because it was altered, utilized in an entirely different genre, and clearly engaged with Kraftwerk’s sonic identity.

It’s worthwhile to consider the practical implications of that. The decision does not allow for the widespread unattributed duplication of already-written music. When the final product is a true creative dialogue with the source—not a copy, not a disguise, but a recognizable nod that changes rather than replicates—it allows producers to sample without prior permission. This is not a small clarification for hip-hop, electronic music, or the enormous online ecosystems of remix culture that have grown over the past 20 years. In European law, it’s the closest thing to a formal legal basis for sampling.

In response to this single decades-long dispute, Germany has already created Section 51a of its copyright act, a new statutory provision that specifically addresses sampling. The reasoning behind the decision is anticipated to apply to internet remix culture in general, including memes, GIFs, fan edits, and imaginative re-contextualizations of previously published works, in addition to music. The framework is now in place in a way that it wasn’t before, but it remains to be seen if courts apply it consistently across those domains.

There is something genuinely peculiar about the scope of the legal infrastructure that two seconds of rhythm were able to initiate, as I watch all of this take place. Kraftwerk’s stance makes sense because Hütter based his entire creative identity on the notion that the sounds Kraftwerk produced were carefully constructed, purposefully positioned objects rather than raw materials for another person’s production. It is not irrational to argue that permission should be obtained for even a short, altered fragment. However, thirty years of litigation, which has consumed a significant amount of judicial resources across numerous nations and international organizations, also provides insight into what happens when copyright enforcement takes precedence over the artistic practices that characterize a genre.

The legal community’s reaction to the decision is one of true relief. The CJEU’s definition, according to Dr. Nils Rauer, an intellectual property specialist at Pinsent Masons in Frankfurt who commented on the ruling, is practical and something that judges and attorneys can genuinely use when advising clients. The music industry has long lacked that level of consistency when it comes to sampling inquiries. The German federal court still needs to apply the CJEU’s recommendations to the dispute’s post-2021 phase, so the case is not yet fully resolved. However, the direction is clear and the framework is established. After being borrowed in 1997 and litigated ever since, Moses Pelham’s two-second loop has now found a legal home.