How did Noah Kahan end up as a co-writer on one of the biggest songs of the summer?
Stella Lefty, who just released her debut album Long Way Home this past Friday, has had a meteoric rise over the past few months, after the viral success of her debut single “Boston.”
The 24-year-old, whose real name is Stella Lefkofsky, began teasing the song on TikTok back in February before officially releasing it in March, and since then “Boston” has rocketed to the top 5 of the all-genre Billboard Hot 100 chart.
But it hasn’t been without controversy: As with any artist who gets popular, there are plenty of comments online accusing Stella of being an “industry plant” (which doesn’t really mean anything at this point) and also criticizing her for being the daughter of billionaire Groupon co-founder Eric Lefkofsky.
We’ve even been accused of being “paid shills” for Stella, despite the fact that we’ve written a grand total of one article about her, and interviewed her once at a music festival. (To set the record straight: We’ve never been paid to promote Stella Lefty, and interviewing her was 100% our decision and not something her team or anyone else asked us to do. She was also an absolute delight to talk to and couldn’t have been nicer, which goes a long way in this industry).
Anyway, another criticism that Stella has received on “Boston” is that the song sounds a lot like “Stick Season,” the 2022 hit single from folk pop superstar Noah Kahan.
Here’s a video that compares the two without commentary:
@jarredjermaine Did anyone else notice this about Stella Lefty “Boston”? #stellalefty #boston #noahkahan #music
I’ll be honest, I don’t hear it as much as other people. Are they similar? I guess, but it wasn’t my first thought when I heard “Boston.”
Well apparently they were similar enough that Kahan is listed as a co-writer on Stella’s song, and in a recent interview with Vanity Fair she explained how the “Stick Season” writer came to be credited on “Boston.”
According to Stella, she had no intention of creating an interpolation of “Stick Season” when she wrote her song:
“When I was writing the song, I wasn’t thinking about Noah Kahan. I was literally thinking about nothing at all.”
After it was released though, Kahan’s team reached out:
“We think this sounds similar.”
To avoid the potential for legal action, and no doubt an embarrassing ordeal for an artist who was just trying to get her music career off the ground, Stella said she decided to give Kahan songwriting credit on the song:
“I don’t want to step on anybody’s toes, so I’m like, if this sounds like that, whatever, all good.”
Of course we’ve seen plenty of instances where artists are accused of copying another’s song. Many of those cases are settled the same way Stella ended up handling this one: By adding the other artist as a co-writer.
But there have also been some dubious cases over the years where artists are overzealous in claiming that somebody copied them. And I get wanting to protect your work, but there are only so many notes and melodies out there, so we have to find a balance between protecting against actual infringement and not stifling creativity to the point that someone is always trying to take credit for someone’s original work.
It seems like Stella decided that it wasn’t worth the hassle on this one, especially this early in her career. And it worked out pretty for everybody, because “Boston” has become a massive hit.
If you want to see our full interview with Stella Lefty from earlier this summer, you can check it out here:
