Earlier this month, in a lawsuit filed in federal court, a producer and rapper from Oregon named Aviel Hirschfield claimed he was driving to Seattle last year in a friend’s borrowed Maybach when “I Follow Rivers,” the 2011 indie-pop classic by Swedish singer Lykke Li, started playing. It’d been a minute since he’d heard the song; Hirschfield said he was struck by how catchy its hook was. Hirschfield alleged that he then began writing a Lykke Li-inspired chorus that, less than six months later, would be featured, verbatim, on Drake’s global hit “Janice STFU.”
It would be a stunning story if proven to be true, but that lawsuit is dead for now, raising serious questions about the nature — and legitimacy — of Hirschfield’s claims. Barely 10 days after it was filed, the case has been voluntarily dismissed, according to a recent court filing.
The dismissal marks a sharp turn of events for a case that was covered and dissected endlessly in the week-plus since the complaint was first filed, from music publications like this one to the mainstream Canadian press to a flurry of vlogs, podcasts, and viral threads debating the legitimacy of the allegations against Drake. Through it all, Drake’s team categorically denied the allegations, describing the lawsuit as “manufactured and baseless.”
In an initial interview with Rolling Stone last week, a representative for Hirschfield was confident about the producer’s allegations that Drake had stolen “his copyrighted music and [claimed] it as their own” on the chorus of “Janice STFU.” The song anchored Drake’s comeback on Iceman and is, by some metrics, one of the biggest hits of the rapper’s career. “The complaint speaks for itself,” the representative said during that initial interview. “This song was written specifically for Drake using music provided to [Hirschfield] that was created by Drake’s producers.”
It’s not clear what transpired after that. But, in a surprising twist, just days after Rolling Stone sent several additional follow-up questions to Hirschfield’s attorney, the producer officially withdrew the case in court.
At the center of the short-lived case was a recording leaked to X that purported to be a demo recording by Hirschfield, complete with a pitched-down vocal singing the familiar chorus of “Janice STFU.”
In an interview with Rolling Stone last week, a representative for the producer stood by the legitimacy of the demo recording, stating that “multiple experts” had already examined the metadata Hirschfield provided for the file and deemed it legitimate. But as soon as it leaked online, assorted internet sleuths wondered if the demo seemed suspicious.
When it was first reported, the case raised a number of larger questions: Why would Drake, who’s dealt with his share of controversy, reputational damage, and litigation in recent years, open himself to more legal trouble by neglecting to credit a songwriter who wrote the lyrics to the song’s chorus? How did an essentially unknown producer with no mainstream writing credits prior to 2022 become not only a credited songwriter for Beyoncé (he’s listed on one song from Renaissance), but also, so he claimed, the composer of the entire chorus of one of the biggest pop songs of this year? How could Hirschfield have written a song to a beat in January 2026 when another one of the producers involved with the song’s creation recently told Billboard that the beat wasn’t written until March? And, finally, in a hit that borrows its chorus melody from a well-known song from 2011, how do copyright infringement cases work in a music industry more reliant than ever on interpolations and reinterpretations of older material?
The most basic question of the case was even simpler: Who is Aviel Hirschfield? The 33-year-old Portland, Oregon, musician describes himself on LinkedIn as a “studio manager, audio engineer, and music producer” and states that his clients have included everyone from Playboi Carti and Travis Scott to Star Wars and Disney. (Rolling Stone was unable to reach Hirschfield directly for comment for this story.)
Prior to making headlines for suing Drake, the most high-profile moment of Hirschfield’s career, by a long measure, was when he received a co-writing credit for “Heated,” an album cut on Beyoncé’s 2022 album Renaissance. The writing credits for the song are currently shared by more than a dozen different individuals. One of them is Hirschfield; another is Drake. This connection to Drake was emphasized heavily in Hirschfield’s lawsuit, and in much of the initial press surrounding it.
When “Heated” was released, Hirschfield exclaimed on X that he had “co-produced” Beyoncé’s song. In some published credits, Hirschfield is listed as having provided guitars and co-produced the song. In other versions of the credits, Hirschfield (listed as Calev) is credited simply with having provided guitar. Today, on Spotify, he’s credited with being one of 18 songwriters on the track. A representative for Beyoncé did not respond when asked to clarify Hirschfield’s contributions to the song.
Judging by his online presence, it’s fair to say Hirschfield has dined out on his Beyoncé credit. In an industry where name-dropping and connections are currency, who wouldn’t? The journeyman producer has posted repeatedly about the album’s success; when Renaissance was nominated for nine Grammys, he showed up at the awards ceremony in L.A. and managed to give a red-carpet interview.
“I started the idea for the song that I produced maybe five years ago,” Hirschfield said then. “I knew that the idea was good. I just had to find the right home.”
Three years after those awards, Hirschfield brought forth his allegations in the now-dismissed suit against Drake.
Songwriters and producers are often wary of bringing forward copyright claims against big stars, for fear of professional repercussions, says Kevin Greene, a copyright scholar and professor of law. “If you’re in the songwriting community, you have to think hard about whether you want to sue Drake, even if there’s an infringement,” Greene says. “[It’s a question of], ‘Do you want to work again? With that on your resume?’”
And even when songwriters and producers do come forward with allegations of copyright theft involving famous pop songs, that doesn’t mean it’s easy to assess the merits of their claims. Brian Levenson, an entertainment and copyright lawyer, says it’s not uncommon for his firm to turn down frivolous copyright cases: “I’ve gotten calls that are like, ‘Billy Joel’s “Piano Man” infringes on my work.’”
