First “Stick Season,” then “There’s Your Trouble” and now apparently “I’ll Name The Dogs”?
The “interpolation” speculation surrounding Stella Lefty is heating up once again after another song from her debut album, Long Way Home, was called out for sounding reminiscent of Blake Shelton’s 2017 radio hit. The 24-year-old Chicago native (I know, shocker, she’s not actually from Boston) has already developed a bit of a messy pattern in that department. Her debut single about the Northeast state was previously accused of drawing heavily from “Stick Season,” ultimately resulting in Noah Kahan receiving a writing credit on the track.
For many fans, the close similarities between the track and Kahan’s 2022 staple were pretty undeniable, with resurfaced videos exposing her many covers of the track over the years and thus forcing her to admit that maybe, just maybe, she may have taken a bit of inspiration from one of her favorite tunes. The saga continued when listeners noticed that Lefty also credited the writers behind the Dixie Chicks’ “There’s Your Trouble,” citing the track as an interpolation for the melody of her song “Summer You Were Mine.”
With these two incidents still fresh in everyone’s minds, internet sleuths can’t help but continue to pick apart her fresh discography in search of other potential influences. Most recently, they’ve put the album’s 14th and final track, “Why Wouldn’t We,” under the microscope.
Many people have since called out similarities between the song’s lyrical structure and Shelton’s “I’ll Name the Dogs,” with Lefty singing:
I’ve got a lighter and you’ve got the smokes
You like to laugh and I got the jokes
You got a floor and I’ve got the clothes
Boy, by now, you gotta know
I’ve got a heart and you’ve got the key
You probably don’t even need to listen to the song to visualize the parallel cadence found in Shelton’s hit penned by Ben Hayslip, Josh Thompson, and Matt Dragstrem:
I’ll hang the pictures, you’ll hang the stars
You’ll pick the paint, I’ll pick a guitar
Sing you a song out there with the crickets and the frogs
You’ll name the babies and I’ll name the dogs, yeah
While Lefty’s flouncy teen anthem co-written by herself (under her legal name Lefkofsky), alongside Steph Jones, Emily Weisband, and Grady Block could simply fall under the “list country” umbrella, using a tit-for-tat lyrical structure similar to Shelton’s, fans have continued to draw comparisons to other songs as well.
Some are saying the melody is reminiscent of Miley Cyrus’ “The Climb,” which makes sense for the 2000’s baby who seems to be heavily influenced by the nostalgic musical era of her childhood, but to my ears the similarities aren’t as drastic. However, as others have pointed out, including one Twitter user @brokenciggies, there are also some remnants of the sound of RaeLynn’s 2014 song “God Made Girls.”
While I’m no music copyright law expert and can’t say for certain whether this case warrants another round of songwriting credits, the speculation has unfortunately put another damper on Lefty’s already “Daddy’s-money”-tarnished image. But hey, the controversy may have at least earned her a few extra streams from listeners eager to play song detective. With that in mind, if you’d like to compare Lefty’s track with all of its alleged soundalikes for yourself, check them out below.