Question on Music Publishing and Rights

[rahul_mukerji]

Hi

I had a few questions with respect to music publishing and rights and I was hoping someone could help clarify things.

• When someone releases a song / album, how do they ensure that they retain the publishing rights to the song ?
• I understand ASCAP/BMI collect royalties and that its not really possible for an individual to track all the royalties, so do artists pay BMI/ASCAP a sum to collect the royalties on their behalf ?
• Also ASCAP and BMI only hold licensing for public performance and not publishing of the music, correct ?
• In essence, a Record Label is a vehicle for distribution and covering oneself in case of liability [maybe I've oversimplified that]?
• Would a Self Made Record Label that owns the publishing rights to the songs be a better approach than having it against the artists name ?
• And any other thing I should be aware of / you would advise / suggest with respect to the business side of music ?

The reason I'm asking is because my band is getting close to finishing their CD and I'd like to know the business side of the Industry so I'm well aware of the common mistakes / pitfalls people can make.

Since a lot of forum members have released their Albums here I thought this would be a good place to ask.

Thanks !

 

[leftyguitarjoe]

Thanks to the internet, most of that stuff doesnt matter.

Self release on Bandcamp or something. You're protected. If someone rips you off, it will be easy to prove.

The music business is in a weird transitional state because of the internet. Nobody knows whats going on. Just put your music up for free and find ways to get your target audience to hear it.

Someone is going to hop in and say I'm wrong and give you a 100 part to-do list of unnecessary and over-complicated stuff that you probably wont do anyway. Ignore them.

 

[TedEH]

I wouldn't go as far as saying you should just put up everything for free, but I can agree with the rest of that. I don't know the details, but cds I've played on were put out there using CDBaby, which gets you on itunes, spotify, etc. and they pay you the royalties from that.

 

[Rev2010]

I can't elaborate too much on PRO's such as BMI or ASCAP since I'm only going to be using one for the first time with the recent release of my second Industrial/Goth album through CDBaby. The album is live on their site but we haven't gotten to the point yet where they ask us to chose which one we want to use. I've done some searching online and think we'll be using BMI since they don't require the artist to also register a publisher, we can act as our own publisher so we'd be receiving 100% of any royalties vs. 50% without a designated publisher (additional registration fee) on ASCAP - at least that's the info I appear to have taken away from a lookup online.

Whether there's any cash in that for such a small time act is very unlikely but the potential to license one of the songs to be used in any sort of video, film, TV, whatever is more interesting to me.

Sorry I don't have any useful information at this time. Perhaps after we've passed that stage with this release I can write back if I learn any more helpful information.


Rev.

 

[rahul_mukerji]

That's some good advise ! Yeah, I was wondering about the licensing issues for Film and TV.

Rev2010: Since you're your own publisher, are you doing all the groundwork for collecting royalties, and actively promoting your material ? I'm wondering if I should go down the CDBaby Pro / Tunecore route or, like you, publish it myself and see where it takes me. The downside of the approach is I have virtually no contacts in the field and I'm not quite sure on who to contact or how to start.

 

[Rev2010]

Rev2010: Since you're your own publisher, are you doing all the groundwork for collecting royalties, and actively promoting your material ?

Well CDBaby does all the royalty collecting, but yes we do the promoting ourselves.

I'm wondering if I should go down the CDBaby Pro / Tunecore route or, like you, publish it myself and see where it takes me. The downside of the approach is I have virtually no contacts in the field and I'm not quite sure on who to contact or how to start.

OK, I'll give you my opinion but two questions first: 1) Do you have label interest already? 2) Do you want to do music primarily as a career and actively tour and all that?

If you answered yes to #2 and have label interest already then by all means go with the label, without a doubt. A label can get you booked playing shows with other big bands on the bill which would increase your exposure. Plus most labels offer tour support, will do at least some type of advertising, or can at the very least get the album reviewed by known publications.

If you don't care to tour for 2 months straight, like I don't, then a label isn't the best option for you. I'm 41 and have a good paying job, so I have no desire to tour for months and make a quarter of what I'm currently making.

The biggest issue is having no contacts or promotional means, but that is something you can build up. Look how Misha posting on here had helped him get some early on exposure. You can build up a fan base and contacts via many avenues on the internet, it will just take time.

It really just depends on how much energy you're willing to put into your music. I still say independent releasing is best for those already popular (since you keep most of the profit then and already have a fanbase) and for those that aren't willing to take the chances or make the sacrifices that would be required of signing to a label. A label isn't going to want to sign you and have you sit at home not out there busting your ass making some noise to get attention - they don't make money then.


Rev.

 

[rahul_mukerji]

Good reply

In response to your questions:

• I have no label interest.
• I have a day time job as well and am not looking to start a career in music

So with that being said, I think your approach sounds well grounded, for a person in my position. I'm absolutely willing to put in the effort and try and get contacts, I just wanted some info about signing away your rights / publishing / music; and trying my best to keep track of what I should and should not do to help push my music out there, as far as possible within my means.

Thanks again Rev2010 !

 

[Dayn]

Sounds like you're more interested in the newer publishing platforms. That's easy, because there's pretty much no negotiation. I doubt you'd need a lawyer, because it's just 'accept the terms of this contract or piss off'.

Read the terms and conditions of every online publisher you're looking at and make sure you understand everything. That's about all you need to do. That's the beauty of digital distribution these days, it's all wrapped up in a neat little package. Except you can't refuse any part of the package, so make sure it's the one you want by reading everything three times over beforehand.

And as always, consult a legal professional if you're unsure about anything.

 

[Rev2010]

it's all wrapped up in a neat little package. Except you can't refuse any part of the package

There are lots of options to refuse certain aspects. Not sure what aspects you're referring to that are set in stone, yes there are numerous set in stone specifics but many that are flexible or perfectly decidable. For example, you can decide which stores you want your music to go to. Don't like the fact that Amazon sells your album for $8.99 when others have it for $9.99, don't submit it to Amazon. Of course it would be great to be able to set your desired price, that part is set in stone on most stores for digital downloads, but not for physical CD's. You can also choose which territories you want to distribute to specifically if you don't want to just "do it all". You can chose which PRO you want to use, or none at all. You can have one company distributing the music and use another for publishing or for collecting from the PRO. I dunno, I think there are quite a lot of variables we have the ability to decide, but yes then there are those that we can't. The good news, like I said, is you can just omit a company whose practices or rules you don't agree with. Don't like the fact that Spotify pays a tenth of a cent per stream? Don't submit to them.


Rev.

 

[rahul_mukerji]

Thanks Dayn and Rev2010 for the insights !

I'm going to be going over the "The Devil is in the Details" aspect of each prospective distributor (leaning heavily towards CDBaby for now) before I make an informed decision.

Thanks again for all the information !

 

[Rev2010]

leaning heavily towards CDBaby for now

One more bonus that recently drew my attention is that CDBaby's music player widget is HMTL5 so it works on all mobile devices as opposed to Tunecore's which is still Flash. I have Flash on my Android but no iPhone users can view my Tunecore widget on my website, but at least they can view the new album's widget. I emailed Tunecore just last week about this asking if there's an HTML5 player on the horizon and their answer was, "Our player is flash so it can't be viewed on mobile devices. It's possible in the future but there currently aren't any plans".


Rev.

 

[rahul_mukerji]

That is actually a pretty good advantage, given that iPad users do not get flash on their devices, and even at work, since they regulate the versions of browsers and plugins [and are therefore quite behind on versions], adobe links frequently fail / crash.

HTML5 plugins however, work flawlessly. So there is a serious upside to that.