Original URL: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/03/31/down_under_appeal/
Men at Work lose Down Under plagiarism appeal
Must cough royalties for Kookaburra rip-off
Posted in Media, 31st March 2011 12:28 GMT
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Australia's Federal Court has rejected an appeal by EMI Music and Men at Work against a ruling that part of the 1983 hit Down Under was lifted from Kookaburra Sits in the Old Gum Tree.
In February last year, a Sydney court decided that a flute riff from Down Under was indeed swiped from the 1934 song written by Marion Sinclair for a Girl Guides Jamboree.
Kookaburra copyright holder Larrikin Music hoped to trouser 40-60 per cent of the song's earnings from songwriters Colin Hay and Ron Strykert, although a costs hearing "ordered that the band must pay five per cent of money earned from the song since 2002 as well as future royalties", the BBC explains [1].
Last year, Hay defended that any reference to Kookaburra was "inadvertent, naive, unconscious", adding: "By the time Men At Work had recorded the song, it had become unrecognisable."
EMI Music's appeal described the offending flute riff as "at most, a form of tribute to the tune", which can only be detected by a "highly educated musical ear".
The court disagreed, and its decision allows Larrikin Music to proceed with its claim for "millions of dollars" from Hay and Strykert. ®