EXCLUSIVE: Men At Work's Colin Hay Talks About "Down Under" Legal Battle Post by: Dave-O 8 June, 2011 - 11:40 AM

(Photo: Getty Images)

Colin Hay is a legend of Aussie music, national treasure even. So when he got tangled up in a legal battle over Men At Work's "Down Under" fans were saying it was an injustice.

"A lot of people feel it's their song and there's somebody messing with it. And I think there's a lot of truth to that. The public support has been enormous, so that feels very good," said Colin of the 80's No. 1 hit.

Indeed, a lot of fans reckon "Down Under" is Australia's unofficial national anthem. Triple M's Becko spoke to the ex-Men At Work frontman recently about the legal battle he lost last year. The federal court ruled against him, Men At Work's Ron Strykert and EMI saying they had ripped off the flute riff from the Aussie children's song "Kookaburra Sits In The Old Gum Tree". (Listen to the video above to decide for yourself).

"From the second day of the hearing, I got the distinct impression which way it was going to go. I don't think that [Larrikin Music Publishing] made a fantastic case. We lost it more than anything else," he admitted.

But Colin still didn't agree with the ruling. "There's a very narrow view of copyright law in my opinion, because 'Kookaburra' is essentially four bars long, [and] they were saying 'two bars were referenced therefore that's 50% of the music therefore infringement has occurred'. And that's what the justice agreed with.

"We were saying 'you can't decide infringement has occurred unless you look at both songs'. Within the framework of "Down Under" the line was subsumed to be unrecognisable and remained unrecognisable for twenty years.

"But the annoying part for me was they wanted a ridiculous percentage of "Down Under". So it's not as if that's in the ballpark where we can go 'well, we can deal with that' so you have to go to litigation.

"At the end of the day they ended up with 5% of a particular version of the song. If they had come at that at the start, we could've sat down and settled this without three years of litigation and three years of legal costs. That's really the upsetting part of it."

Compare the two songs in the video above and tell us what you think.

Leave your comment

• Aaron Klein says

  What a money grap. If it takes 20 years to; one work out it sounds similiar, two as Men At Work say why would you go straight to court. Some people are ridiculous.

  Posted Wednesday 8 June, 2011 12:00 PM
• JP says

  I remember as a kid growing up in Canada and Down-under came on and after the second time the Kookaburra bit was played we were singing the "sits in the old gumtree" party. I don't see what the big deal is.

  Posted Wednesday 8 June, 2011 1:40 PM