My lyrics got butchered! What to do?

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I have a friend who's been writing songs about as long as I have (15 years). He's a better guitar player than I am, but his lyrics are generic. I'm the opposite--creative lyrics, boring guitar. So I gave him some lyrics to set to music.

Unfortunately, he butchered them! He took out about half of what I had written and replaced it with a bunch of boring cliches. He turned the song into something it wasn't meant to be at all. He took my original subject matter and added lovey-dovey stuff and stuff about loving the open road. Boring!

And he wants to record it like that and put it on his next record! Maybe I should be flattered, but I keep thinking over this dilemma:

If he gives me full credit for the lyrics, I get 50% of what he makes off the song, but I look like an idiot. If I get half credit for the lyrics, I'd only get 25% at most, and no one would know that I had written the good parts of the lyrics.

I wrote to him about it, but I'm kind of powerless because he's moderately successful commercially, and I'm not. What can I do?

Take the money.

Look at Chris Martin. He's written songs for the likes of Jamelia, but his credibility's not gone anywhere.

Loads of great songwriters will write crap for other people.

You just wrote something good and had it turned into crap. Don't let him take credit for making a song worse. The only way to really get your just desserts here is to deny him any money for molesting your song.

Is there any possibility of being able to sit down with him, discuss what you don't like and improve it together? If not..

I don't see how a half credit is going to improve your position at all. I worry that if you withdraw your lyrics entirely you'll look back and feel you missed out. To be honest, I'd just take the cash. Opportunities to make money from this sort of thing don't come by often, so I would grab this one while you can!

This is already turning out far better than I thought it would. I talked to him about it. We agreed to disagree. He's going to use another one of my songs instead, without changing anything. Sounds good for both of us!

Now I think I might have over-reacted, but I'm a perfectionist about writing; I can't help it. My songs are like my children. Anyway, if he wants to use a third one, and change it, I'll probably go along with it. Overall, it is a good opportunity.

Collaborations are like that sometimes. Keep track of the songs he changed and release them another time with the original lyrics.

Elton John dropped the last verse of "Daniel", according to the booklet in "Elton John Greatest Hits 1970-2002", so you're in excellent company with Bernie Taupin.