Ex-Europe Guitarist Blasts Poison

Ex-Europe Guitarist Blasts Poison
Photo credits: Louise O'Gorman / Sound Pollution, CC BY 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons; Weatherman90 at en.wikipedia, CC BY 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Former Europe guitarist Kee Marcello is not a fan of Poison. His ’80s Swedish glam rock outfit, Easy Action, took legal action against Poison for allegedly stealing the chorus to their song, “We Go Rocking” for the Poison hit, “I Want Action.” According to Marcello, Easy Action was awarded a financial settlement in the case. Marcello explained his position recently on the “White Line Fever” podcast. “I got in contact with the producer of Poison’s (‘Look What The Cat Dragged In’) album, Ric Browde, and he told me he brought the Easy Action album and the Hanoi Rocks album to the studio when he did the Poison album, and he put on ‘We Go Rocking’ and suggested the band make a cover out of it. And they said, ‘It’s a f*cking Swedish glam band. Who’s gonna know?’ And they just ripped us off. And this is Ric Browde personally saying this. So it’s so f*cking obvious that it happened.”

Marcello explained, “If it would have been me doing such a mistake, I would say, ‘I’m so sorry. I f*cked up. Man, I took your song. I’m so sorry. I’m gonna make it up to you.’ (But) to this day, believe it or not, they completely bluntly deny it. When Poison played at Sweden Rock Festival, they had a press conference, and somebody asked — a lot of people asked — ‘What about Kee Marcello? What about Easy Action? What about ‘We Go Rocking’?’ And they said, ‘(We) never heard of any of those.’ And that was the end of it. Then people tried to go on, but they just bluntly denied it. And it’s so ridiculous. At least agree you’re wrong sometimes. So, I don’t know. I don’t wanna see those a**holes.”

Marcello explains that it was the band’s publisher, Warner Chappell Music, that settled out of court with Poison over the dispute. “ … when you do a settlement, they don’t have to (publicly admit) that they (did anything wrong). If we would have taken them to court, I would have been a co-writer on their song, which I think would have been fair.”

Easy Action formed in the early ’80s and was considered a pioneering band on the Scandinavian glam rock scene. The band released a video for a new song, “Dazed,” earlier this year. 

B.J. LISKO
Follow B.J.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT


AROUND THE WEB