The American pop star has been slammed with a hefty lawsuit after her song Stars has been criticised for containing “material taken from the original Sleigh Bells song “Infinity Guitars”  without proper credit. This comes from a statement found in documents gathered by Digital Music News.

Sleigh Bells are an American noise-pop duo formed in 2008 from New York. The songs Infinity Guitar comes from their debut album Treats, which was released back in 2010.

The claim was originally stated last year by Sleigh Bells on Twitter, when they posted:

“@ddlovato Demi Lovato flattered you guys sampled Infinity Guitars & Riot Rhythm for “Stars” but we were not contacted. Gotta clear those.”

However, Demetria Lovato’s producers denied the accusations, telling Rolling Stone, “We did not use any samples in Demi Lovato’s song,” adding “Demi was also not involved with the production.”

The song Stars appeared as a bonus track on her fifth album Confident. Confident debuted at at number one in Canada, while reaching the top 10 in fifteen other countries, including the United Kingdom and the United States.

Nothing was resolved and now a year on, Krauss and Miller have launched legal proceedings against Lovato, Falk, Yacoub, and Universal Music Group.

The lawsuit names Lovato, UMG Recordings and producers Carl Falk and Rami Yacoub as defendants. It states that: “A comparison of the two songs reveals that, at the very least, the combination of the hand claps and bass drum, structured as 3 quarter beats and a rest, with the bass drum providing a counter-rhythm to the hand claps, is at least substantially similar in both works,” states the complaint. “This infringing material repeats throughout the Defendants’ song.”

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the complaint also alleges that “signal decay and other sonic signatures” reveals “virtually identical content” and “transcend the realm of coincidence.”

The lawsuit also states that Sleigh Bells have “suffered actual damages including lost profits, lost opportunities, and loss of goodwill,” going on to say that they are asking for $150,000 “per infringement” along with a “permanent injunction prohibiting the reproduction, distribution, sale, public performance or other use or exploitation of “Infinity Guitars” by defendants.”

Demi Lovato released Confident in October 2015 and is currently on a North American tour to promote the album.

This isn’t the first time Lovato has been called out on controversy within the media. Earlier this year the former Disney star commented on an Instagram ‘meme’ that compared Ariana Grande and Mariah Carey, sparking a barrage of fan wars between the stars. She also posted a video with her mother stating that those competing in Rio this year would contract the Zika virus, which also sparked debate.

Lovato is yet to comment on the claims. The full complaint can be found here. The videos of Stars and Infinity Guitars have been posted below for readers to compare.