A founding member of American band The Rubinoos is suing Avril Lavigne over allegations that she stole chunks of a song he wrote for the power pop outfit for her hit single 'Girlfriend'. The song in question is 'I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend', a hit for The Rubinoos in 1979. The band's founder and songwriter, Tommy Dunbar, claims Lavigne's song uses "substantial chunks" of his song. In particular the chorus of Dunbar's song goes "Hey, hey, you, you, I wanna be your boyfriend" while the chorus to the Lavigne track goes "Hey, hey, you, you, I don't like your girlfriend".
Canadian website Jam Showbiz quote Dunbar's lawyer, Nicholas Carlin thus: "She's made a lot of money off of my client's song. The entire song is not the same, they have different bridges, but the heart and soul of her song is directly taken from our client's song".
But Nettwerk Music chief and Lavigne's manager, Terry McBride, has said the lawsuit is "baseless". He told reporters: "Avril's a great songwriter and she's proving it over and over and over again. Avril's very, very sensible. She knows music well. If the chords had been similar, the melodies had been similar, lyrics had been similar ... she would have gone, 'OK, I can see their point.' But nothing's similar".
Admitting that the lyrics and melodies in Lavigne's song differ from that of Dunbar, Carlin continued: "You don't have to have the entire song to be similar to the original song for it to be an infringement. It just requires a certain, substantial similarity, meaning an important part of the song".
Despite McBride's strong denial of any wrongdoing on Lavigne's part - and he says he has had a musicologist analyse both songs and that the expert could find no significant similarity - he has admitted he might settle out of court because of the cost of defending the claim.