Did Avril Lavigne Plagiarize Another Band's Song?

In 2007, "Girlfriend" was released by Avril Lavigne. Songwriters for the American power pop band The Rubinoos filed a lawsuit claiming "Girlfriend" sounded too much like their song "I Want to Be Your Boyfriend" from 1978. Lavigne said she never heard of the band and cited The Rolling Stones classic "Get Off Of My Cloud" and "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend" by the Ramones for having similar lyrics. Six months later, they reached a confidential settlement out of court.

@AvrilLavigne @therealrubinoos @TheRollingStones

#popmusic #rockmusic #musicvideo #avrillavigne #rollingstones #therubinoos #copyright #musicnews #band

[TommyEdisonShorts]

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[DD_Dux]

This is for sure a song writer thing they rip off old smaller bands for their own songs and music

[Abby.Normal]

Before he mentioned the rolling stones i said their song sounds like get off my cloud. I want to know if they paid the stones

[jacobwaldrop]

The problem is that "i wanna be your (incert noun for noun other) is far too common. It's not shocking there are multiple versions of songs that use it.

[AGETheGawdYT]

Im with Avril. Clearly she took the hey hey you you from the Rolling Stones. Those songs sound nothing the same 😂

[Two_Tone_Xylophone]

The real question in cases like this are if it's intentional or not, imagine being a song writer or any kind of writer, you go through your entire life listening to music or reading books, you become influenced by things that as time goes on you forget about, it's easy to see how things like this could happen by accident....so I don't know if I'd call it a rip off, because to me. That sounds like an intentional thing as opposed to some old memory locked away in your subconscious, coming forward in your work.

[bitplaya]

I feel like it rips off Mickey by Toni Basil

[mr]

The answer is: chord progression and all the music theory stuff. No one is really copying each other, just applying the same principles.


It's just like that video of the person using the 3 chords to play all the pop songs

[noellewithane]

Ummm HEY YOU I (insert word) is very common I'd imagine.

[jcstevegigs]

Hmmm tough call. At first I was thinking yes, she ripped it off but now I’m thinking they both need to start writing checks to Mick & Keith

[NoNameNoWhere]

Considering how often the "rip off" songs turn out better than the "originals" or stand as their own experience in spite of having a few similar chords, it's stupid to get angry over "plaigerism".

It's transformative. I would encourage musicians to copy parts of each other's songs.

Unless a song is damn near identical, song plaigerization lawsuits should fail almost every time.

[nlaslovich]

And that's probably the most money that they saw from that song

[mirroravis]

Most cases like these are more likely to just be because the writer heard the song when they were a kid or in passing and forgot about it. Then they subconsciously remembered it

[TCZL]

It takes huge balls to say you stole "hey, hey, you, you" and "I wanna be your boyfriend" if you're not the Rolling Stones and/or The Ramones.

[jasperle]

If everyone could just give others credit without labels and other entities trying to pull every cent out of the pockets we would have a way different musical environment. Can’t say if it would be recycled repetitive garbage or enhanced new age brilliance but it just would different. Of course everyone pulls from things they’ve heard before even humming a song you think is brand new has been inspired by something you might not even realize you’ve ever heard

[agauthier]

She definitely looks better than any of them

[Btyler]

I dont think they sound that similar. Aside from the lyrics.

[inko]

The problem is that sometimes you think your own ideas not your own you have heard it somewhere but you don’t remember

[Italianbella]

She wasn't even born in 78, i was born in 80, and shes like my age, and i haven’t heard of them

[cowboycinema]

Avril Levine never stole a song her producers did and her label