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October 20, 2021
Gregory Galloway's Playlist for His Novel "Just Thieves"
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Roxane Gay, and many others.
Gregory Galloway's novel Just Thieves is brilliant noir, as dark as it is surprising.
CrimeReads wrote of the book:
"When a book begins with a dead horse, you know it's going to be good, and Just Thieves, a taut, understated, brilliant noir, is not only good but great."
In his own words, here is Gregory Galloway's Book Notes music playlist for his novel Just Thieves:
There’s a brief examination of thievery in my new novel, Just Thieves, where the narrator imagines that the act of stealing goes all the way back to our very beginnings (Eve and the apple), with a mention of musicians such as Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan, and Led Zeppelin taking whatever they wanted for themselves. I was a little surprised how defensive readers got at the mention of Zeppelin. I guess Elvis is a given, Dylan is forgiven, and Zeppelin needs to be defended. Maybe it’s because of their track record of getting caught, and losing at least five plagiarism lawsuits, including “Bring it on Home” (Willie Dixon), “The Lemon Song” (from Howlin’ Wolf’s “The Killing Floor”), and “Whole Lotta Love” (from Muddy Waters’ “You Need Love”). Led Zeppelin loved the blues (is the argument), but if they loved it so much, why didn’t they give the guys who invented it proper credit in the first place?
Of course ripping off black musicians has been a successful strategy for plenty of acts, and plain plagiarism ranges from the obvious - George Harrison taking Ronnie Mack’s “He’s So Fine” for “My Sweet Lord,” or Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams pre-emptively suing Marvin Gaye’s estate over “Blurred Lines” (claiming the estate did not own the copyright). Thicke and Williams lost in court (to the tune of $5.3 million) for their heist of “Got to Give it Up.” - to the less so (Bob Dylan frequently refers to, quotes, and alludes to other songs and writings - more collagist than cadger - but he rarely out and out claims entire songs for himself. Please note the rarely.). Here’s some of my favorite steals:
“Dazed and Confused” - Taking candy from a colleague. I can’t resist to call out Jimmy Page one more time. It’s one thing to pay “homage” to your heroes, but it’s another to steal from your contemporaries. Folk singer Jake Holmes opened for the Yardbirds in 1967, where Jimmy Page heard Holmes’ song “Dazed and Confused.” The Yardbirds soon began playing the song in their live shows, and when Page formed Led Zeppelin in 1968 it was the second song the band recorded, with Page given sole songwriting credit. Holmes (who went on to have a lucrative career writing ad jingles, including “I’m a Pepper,” and “Be all that you can be”) wrote the band seeking credit, but received no reply. It wasn’t until a lawsuit was filed in 2010 (settled out of court) that Holmes’ original was acknowledged (but only as “inspired by” instead of songwriter).
“Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right” - “t’ make new sounds out of old sounds.” Folksinger Paul Clayton taught Bob Dylan the traditional song “Who’s Gonna Buy Your Chickens When I’m Gone,” which Clayton used as the basis for his own "Who's Gonna Buy You Ribbons When I'm Gone?" Dylan used the public domain melody and a few lines from Clayton in his version, which prompted a lawsuit, an out-of-court settlement and acknowledgement from Dylan that "'Don't Think Twice' was a riff that Paul [Clayton] had” in the Biograph liner notes.
“Crocodile Rock” - When getting caught is the point. Elton John’s goof on '50s dance crazes and tribute to 50s music was a playful pastiche of the instantly recognizable sounds of the era, so it was sort of beside the point when someone sued John for theft. The fact that the lawsuit came from the guys who wrote “Speedy Gonzalez” was both insulting and spot-on. While the falsetto “la-la-las” of “Crocodile Rock” are almost exactly like the Pat Boone hit, the songs have little else in common. Responding to the claims of plagiarism (settled out of court), Sir Elton said, “Of course it's a rip-off, it's derivative in every sense of the word."
“Come as You Are” - “name me someone that’s not a parasite.” According to Nirvana’s manager, Danny Goldberg, Kurt Cobain was nervous about releasing the song as the follow-up single to “Smells Like Teen Spirit” because the guitar riff sounded similar to Killing Joke’s “Eighties” (1984). Killing Joke claims they filed a lawsuit, while Goldberg says he never knew about any legal action, and none was ever taken. It might be due to the fact that both guitar riffs sounded like the one in “Life Goes On” by the Damned, released two years before “Eighties.” In the end, a riff is not a song, and Killing Joke and Dave Grohl “had a good laugh” over the dispute when Grohl played drums on their self-titled 2003 album, Killing Joke’s first album in seven years.
“The Old Man Down the Road” - self-incrimination. The ugly truth of the music business is that most musicians don’t own their own songs. So while they’re busy sniping and swiping with each other, the record labels and/or publishing companies are robbing them all. It’s usually these companies that file the copyright claims in most lawsuits, which all came to a farcical conclusion when John Fogerty was sued for plagiarizing himself. Fogerty had given the rights to his songs with Creedence Clearwater Revival to Fantasy Records in order to be released from his contract. And it was Fantasy who sued Fogerty, claiming that he had stolen “Run Through the Jungle” (which Fogerty wrote in 1970). Fogerty famously took the stand with his guitar and demonstrated how the songs were different. A jury not only decided the case in Fogerty’s favor, but awarded him $1.3 million (for his attorney fees). Fogerty v. Fantasy, Inc made it all the way to the Supreme Court in 1993, where it was upheld 8-1 (with Clarence Thomas writing a concurrence, agreeing with the outcome of the case, but did not believe it should be precedent).
“Alone Again” - and the law won. There was a time when hip hop was an exciting experiment, swiping snippets of beats, riffs, hooks, whatever they could get their hands on to create entirely new music. The Beastie Boys, De La Soul, and a whole host of other artists packed their songs with samples. It was great. And then the grown-ups ruined it, when '70s hitmaker and '90s has-been Gilbert O’Sullivan sued Biz Markie for his “unauthorized” use of a sample of “Alone Again (Naturally).” Markie doesn’t hide his use of the song (he even sings “alone again, naturally” in it), but he arguably makes it something else. The court didn’t buy that argument, however (the judge’s decision begins by quoting Exodus 20:15: "Thou shalt not steal”), and stopped sales of Markie’s album, awarded O’Sullivan 100% of the royalties, and determined that all samples (which O’Sullivan’s lawyer said was “a euphemism in the music industry for what anyone else would call pickpocketing”) had to be cleared before release, making it cost-prohibitive for most artists to attempt.
“Creep”/”Get Free” - When thieves cry thief. Recorded in a single take, Radiohead’s debut single was a Top 40 hit and something of a grunge anthem. During the recording, guitarist Ed O’Brien supposedly pointed out that the song sounded an awful lot like “The Air That I Breathe” (a Top 10 hit for The Hollies in 1974). Sure enough, the publishing company sued, and songwriters Albert Hammond and Mike Hazlewood were awarded songwriting credits and a share of the royalties (Hammond praised the band for being “honest” about their use of the song). Fast forward to 2018, when Lana Del Rey announced that she was being sued by Radiohead for copyright infringement of “Creep” on her Top 20 hit “Get Free,” and Radiohead was demanding 100% of the royalties. Radiohead’s publisher stated that they wanted songwriting credit, but denied that the band was seeking all royalties. Despite the fact that “many of the phrases found in the verse and chorus” of “Get Free” use exactly the same notes in the same order as “Creep” (according to one musicologist), no lawsuit appears to have been filed, and no songwriting credits changed.
“The Star-Spangled Banner” - I took it; it’s mine. “America (My Country, ‘Tis of Thee)” is obviously cribbed from the British national anthem, but the tune for “The Star-Spangled Banner” is also swiped from the Brits, taken note for note from “The Anacreontic Song,” a popular 18th century gentleman’s club tune celebrating wine and women.
There’s something pathetic about it all (we’re so unoriginal that we can’t even have our own song?) but also a cocky swagger to the appropriation. It’s a rebellious claim to own something that’s not really ours (and can never truly be. Whenever I hear “My Country ‘Tis of Thee” or “God Save the Queen,” I think, “oh yeah, we stole that”), but it’s also a reminder that we’re forever bound to our past, our licentious gains covered with the dust of other people’s labor. (Ok, I stole that last bit. Sue me).
Gregory Galloway is the author of the novels The 39 Deaths of Adam Strand and the Alex Award-winning As Simple As Snow. His short stories have appeared in the Rush Hour and Taking Aim anthologies. He is a graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop and currently resides in NW Connecticut.
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