Men At Work singer Colin Hay on Friday hit out at a court case that found his iconic Down Under anthem plagiarised a well-known Girl Guides ditty, describing it as “opportunistic greed”.
Hay said the case, which left the band and record companies Sony BMG and EMI facing a hefty compensation and royalties pay-out, was “all about money, make no mistake”.
“I believe what has won today is opportunistic greed, and what has suffered is creative musical endeavour,” Hay wrote in Sydney’s Daily Telegraph.
The Federal Court on Thursday found a catchy flute riff in Down Under bore an unmistakable resemblance to Kookaburra Sits in the Old Gum Tree, which was penned for a Girl Guides jamboree in 1935.
Music company Larrikin, which instigated the proceedings, bought the rights to Kookaburra in 1990.
Hay denied borrowing from Kookaburra when he wrote Down Under in 1978, but said band member Greg Ham “unconsciously referenced” the folk tune when he joined Men At Work a year later.
“It was and continues to be played countless times all over the world, and it is no surprise that in more than 20 years, no one noticed the reference to Kookaburra,” Hay wrote.
“There are reasons for this. It was inadvertent, naive, unconscious, and by the time Men At Work recorded the song, it had become unrecognisable.”
Down Under, an unofficial Australian anthem and jukebox staple worldwide, pays tribute to Vegemite sandwiches and a land where “beer does flow and men chunder [vomit]”. It has sold millions of copies across the globe.
Larrikin’s lawyer, Adam Simpson, said the company would be pushing for the labels, Hay and fellow songwriter Ron Strykert to hand over between 40% and 60% of their earnings from the song. A costs hearing begins on February 25. — AFP