The Hollywood Reporter says the lawsuit, filed last week in Illinois federal court, is over some of the band’s old hits, including "Talk Dirty To Me," "I Won't Forget You," "Fallen Angel" and "Ride the Wind."
The plaintiffs in this new case are Billy McCarthy and James Stonich, who were members of a Chicago band known as Kid Rocker, a group formerly signed to Atlantic Records, and is said to have been a favorite on the Hollywood club scene in the early-1980s. During those years, they created a number of songs, including "Hit and Run" and "Wham Bam Slammin' Romance," which are said to have later been incorporated by Poison in their own work.
In court papers, McCarthy and Stonich describe auditioning future Poison guitarist C.C. DeVille in 1984, and showing him songs they allege would become the basis for later Poison hits.
In a new story by the Hollywood Reporter, Mark D. Passin, attorney for the members of the group Poison, says the claims have absolutely no merit.
"Poison will vigorously defend against the baseless accusations alleged in the complaint," he says. "Obviously, if the Poison songs that are the subject of the complaint infringed any songs written by Plaintiffs McCarthy and Stonich, they would have filed their lawsuit over 20 years ago, when Poison released the albums on which the songs are embodied. It is unfortunate that success in the entertainment business often invites unmeritorious lawsuits."
Song theft allegations are not unusual, but it's not every day that a band faces allegations over material created so long ago.
As for the intriguing question of why it took the Kid Rocker members more than two decades to launch a claim, Poison's lawyer promises to get sworn answers about this during the litigation.
Read more at the Hollywood Reporter here.
Poison Poison – I Won’t Forget You (1986)
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