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| From | "Ron Katcher" <ronkatcher@hotmail.com> |
| Subject | Re: rubinoos/avril you decide |
| Date | Wed, 11 Jul 2007 12:04:41 -0400 |
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Didn't someone post earlier that Dr. Luke had actually produced a cover
version of the Rubinoos' tune earlier in his career? Gottwald's quote in
this article would seem to directly refute that. Curious, because it seems
it would be a fairly easy statement to refute.
Ron K.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Drew MacDonald" <drewmacdonald1@gmail.com>
To: <audities@smoe.org>
Sent: Wednesday, July 11, 2007 11:53 AM
Subject: Re: rubinoos/avril you decide
> I'm way behind on Audities posts in general and this thread in
> particular, but here's something from today's entertainment section of
> the Los Angeles Times:
>
>
> LAVIGNE CLASH WIDENS
> Songwriters, lawyers, musicologists and PR people get into the debate
> over the genesis of 'Girlfriend.'
>
>
> By Chris Lee, Times Staff Writer
> July is shaping up to be the cruelest month for Avril Lavigne.
>
> Over the last two weeks, the pop princess' carefully crafted image as
> the anti-Britney — that is, a chart-topping ingenue who writes her own
> songs, spits at paparazzi and has shaped her own spiky-yet-vulnerable
> image — has come under attack on multiple fronts.
>
> In a lawsuit made public last week, the 22-year-old Canadian superstar
> is being sued for copyright infringement for allegedly plagiarizing a
> substantial part of "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend," a song by '70s new
> wave group the Rubinoos, for her worldwide smash hit "Girlfriend."
>
> As with most Information Age disputes, the controversy has spilled
> over onto YouTube.com, where various video clips highlighting
> similarities between the two songs — specifically, their sing-song-y,
> call-and-response choruses of "Hey, hey/You, you" — have been streamed
> more than 1.4 million times since last Wednesday.
>
> Now, speaking publicly on the matter for the first time,
> "Girlfriend's" co-writer Lukasz "Dr. Luke" Gottwald has lashed out at
> the plaintiffs — songwriters James Gangwer and original Rubinoos
> member Tommy Dunbar — denying allegations that he and Lavigne "copied"
> "Boyfriend."
>
> "I never heard of the Rubinoos before the lawsuit," said Gottwald, an
> in-demand producer who has crafted hits for Kelly Clarkson, Pink and
> Daughtry, among others. "I never heard of the song and neither has
> Avril. I would take a polygraph on that in front of them."
>
> "Me and Avril wrote the song together," Gottwald told The Times. "It
> started out with Avril wanting to make something fun and upbeat. It
> has the same chord progressions as 10 different Blink-182 songs, the
> standard changes you'd find in a Sum 41 song. It's the Sex Pistols,
> not the Rubinoos."
>
> The lead singer of the Rubinoos, Jon Rubin (who is not a part of the
> lawsuit because he didn't write it), told The Times that in terms of
> meter and chord progression, "Girlfriend" bears a close resemblance to
> "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend." He also thinks that "Girlfriend" has more
> similarities to a 1997 cover version of the song, retitled "I Wanna Be
> Your Girlfriend" by the female-fronted Brit-pop band Lush. Rubin said:
> "We got tons of e-mails about it. 'You guys must be collecting big
> dough now.' Well, actually not."
>
> "Girlfriend" has sold 2.6 million copies worldwide and topped singles
> charts in the U.S., Italy, New Zealand, Austria, Ireland and Sweden.
> Lavigne was unreachable for comment, her manager said, but defended
> herself Friday on her MySpace page:
>
> "Off the top of my head, two other songs that I can immediately think
> of with this type of lyric are 'Hey, hey, you, you get off of my
> cloud' by the Rolling Stones and 'Hey little girl I want to be your
> boyfriend' by the Ramones," the singer writes. "Simply put, I have
> been falsely accused of ripping their song off. Luke and I have done
> nothing wrong and there is no claim to their part."
>
> Lavigne's mensis horribilis began with the June issue of Performing
> Songwriter magazine (which went largely overlooked by the media until
> making headlines in Canada last week then rippling out around the
> world), in which Chantal Kreviazuk, who co-wrote much of Lavigne's
> 2004 triple platinum-selling album "Under My Skin," ridiculed the
> notion that Lavigne writes her own material.
>
> The allegation cuts to the core of Lavigne's self-made persona.
>
> "I mean, Avril, songwriter?" Kreviazuk said in the article. "Avril
> doesn't really sit and write songs by herself or anything." And in the
> interview, the songwriter said that she brought Lavigne a song called
> "Contagious" that was rejected, only to later discover a song called
> "Contagious" turn up on Lavigne's third album, "The Best Damn Thing,"
> that song credited to Lavigne and co-writer Evan Taubenfeld.
>
> Lavigne has responded to those allegations on MySpace.
>
> "Chantal's comments are damaging to my reputation and a clear
> defamation of my character and I am considering taking legal action,"
> Lavigne writes.
>
> On Tuesday, Kreviazuk, who is represented by Nettwerk Music Group, a
> management firm that also represents Lavigne, issued a retraction,
> saying in part: "Avril has in no way stolen my song…. My statements
> and any inference from my statements, which call into question Avril's
> ethics or ability as a respected and acclaimed songwriter should be
> disregarded and retracted."
>
> Over the last week, a publicity firm hired by "Boyfriend's"
> songwriters has traded accusatory press releases with Lavigne's
> manager, Terry McBride, and her label, Sony BMG. Each camp blames the
> other for taking the case public. The complaint was filed in U.S.
> District Court in San Francisco in late May, but was posted on the
> Internet last week.
>
> "We were surprised and taken completely off guard," McBride said. "We
> were in settlement discussions. Then on July 3, I start getting
> deluged with interview requests. We've been professional. They broke
> the news. We've had to react to it."
>
> Nicholas Carlin, a lawyer for songwriters Dunbar and Gangwer, denied
> drawing first blood. "I have every respect for Avril Lavigne. We tried
> everything we could to keep it out of the public eye," he said.
> "That's why we filed the complaint with Mr. Gottwald named as the
> first defendant — so that the press wouldn't pick up on it
> immediately."
>
> Both the plaintiffs and defendants hired musicologists to prepare
> reports on "Girlfriend's" and "Boyfriend's" respective similarities
> and dissimilarities.
>
> Not surprisingly, Dunbar and Gangwer's musicologist found "an
> unusually high degree of similarity between the songs," Carlin said. A
> report by musicologist Anthony Ricigliano, commissioned by Lavigne's
> management and made available to The Times, states: "Although these
> compositions contain similar material, they do not share any
> significant similarity in lyric content, melodic content (pitch
> series, rhythm or rhythmic patterns, melodic development or structure)
> or harmonic content, to suggest that 'Girlfriend' was copied from
> 'Boyfriend.' " "
>
> In 2001, Ricigliano famously testified on behalf of singer Michael
> Bolton in the landmark copyright infringement case Three Boys Music
> vs. Michael Bolton. In that case, the jury went against Ricigliano's
> expert opinion, awarding $5.4 million to the plaintiffs, the Isley
> Brothers, who claimed Bolton had ripped off their 1966 song "Love Is a
> Wonderful Thing" for his 1991 hit with the same title.
>
> Gottwald admitted to conflicting impulses of outrage and conciliation.
> "I've never been sued before for plagiarism," he said. "I'm
> disappointed in humanity but open to discussions. I would love to talk
> to [Dunbar and Gangwer] to sit down with them and steer them in a
> direction to be positive."
>
> ________________________________
> chris.lee@latimes.com
>
>
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