Did the Jonas Brothers Copy Portugal the Man’s Breakthrough Hit For Their Chart-Topping Comeback Single?

The Portland band jokingly (?) accused the reunited pop trio of ripping off their 2017 mega-hit "Feel It Still."

Portugal the Man performs at March for Our Lives. (CJ Monserrat)
By Matthew Singer

Only a few years ago, Portugal the Man was a band known to a relatively small number of mainstream alt-rock fans. Now, the Portland-based group has become ubiquitous enough that they're getting ripped off by acts with much greater name recognition. Allegedly.

In 2017, the band, which started in Alaska 13 years earlier, came out of nowhere to score one of the biggest hits of the year, the soul-rock twister "Feel It Still." The song has been streamed a whopping 625 million times on Spotify to date and won the group a Grammy.

Even two years later, you still hear the song everywhere, from the radio to television commercials. And now, it's even started popping up in other artists' songs.

In February, the reunited Jonas Brothers relaunched their career with "Sucker," a pop-rock ear-worm that shot to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. And if you ask Portugal the Man, it bears more than a passing resemblance to their breakthrough single.

"To be fair, the chorus of 'Feel It Still' sounds very similar to 'Please Mister Postman' by the Marvellettes… which we respectfully cleared and thanked them for every chance we got. As one does," the band wrote on Twitter while tagging the brothers Jonas. They also retweeted several accusations of thievery from fans, one of whom referred to "Sucker" as "Feel It Steal."

Since then, the band has made it clear that they're not mad, they're laughing, actually. Responding to a Tweet asking if they were legit upset, the band wrote, "Not mad at all. Actually dig a lot of their music and Nick's solo records." ("Jealous" is indeed still a bop.) And just last night, the group once again clarified, "Y'all know we got nothing against the Jonas Brothers right?"

But then again, they also haven't said they don't feel like "Sucker" is a "Feel It Still" ripoff.

The Jonas Brothers haven't publicly responded. If you ask us, the songs certainly have a similar, uh, feel, but that's mostly where the overlap ends. Listen to the two below and judge for yourself:

Related: Portugal. The Man Wants to Help Maintain Portland’s Community-Minded Punk-Rock Soul

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