Gotye had the best-selling song of 2012 with Somebody That I Used to Know and there is a ton of fascinating info behind this track. First, Gotye’s real name is Wouter “Wally” De Backer and he was based in Australia. The woman on the record is a New Zealand singer named Kimbra.
There’s a sample in the song—a 1967 track called Seville—that was cleared from a Brazilian artist named Luis Bonfa. The deal stipulated that Gotye would share royalties 55-45 with Bonfa, who got a co-writing credit on the song. The success of Somebody I Used to Know made Bonfa a millionaire. Too bad he died in 2001.
Gotye also insisted that there be no pre-roll ads before the song’s music video on YouTube. That means he forfeited more than $10 million in royalties for his artistic principles. He also made the song available online for free, which cost him even more.
Didn’t matter, though. Gotye has been comfortably retired since 2014.
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