Music publishing royalties laid bare

[Brian G Turner]

I know it's about music publishing, rather than writers publishing - but I find the way the industry is taken apart and laid bare for all the different royalty streams absolutely fascinating - and potentially of use and interest for writers wanting to find out how the wider creative industries work:
BBC News - Did Lily Allen really make £8,000 for her Christmas ad?

 

[Brian G Turner]

This is an interesting update to the above, where indie musicians are allegedly being threatened by Google - sign up to a new Youtube streaming service with low royalty rates, or else be excluded from Youtube entirely:
BBC News - Billy Bragg and other indie musicians blast YouTube rates

Not of interest to writers? Suppose in 5 years time, Amazon tells publishers they must include their books in their Prime lending service, for reduced royalties, or else be excluded from Amazon?

 

[Ursa major]

The history of monopolies, and monopsonies, is not generally one of kindliness and fluffiness. And even if some of today's monopolists and monopsonists happen to be kindly and fluffy, there's no guarantee that less kindly and less fluffy people won't take their businesses over at some stage. Unless one believes that those financing such takeovers are naturally kindly and fluffy. (Corporate bankers...? Hedge fund managers...? I'm guessing not.)

 

[Dave]

...all that money goes to Tim Rice-Oxley, Tom Chaplin, Richard Hughes - better known as Keane - who penned the song's music and lyrics in 2004

Surely, that is exactly fair and correct? Lily Allen only sung the song. Someone else arranged it, an orchestra or band played the music, and Keane wrote it. Her part played is really quite a minor one.

What I don't comprehend is the royalties on music and lyrics. Famously, George Harrison was sued because My Sweet Lord was supposed, in the view of a Judge, to sound like the Ronnie Mack penned song He's So Fine. Last week, I heard my daughter listening to the chart-topping hit by Sam Smith, Stay With Me. It sounds suspiciously to me like I Won't Back Down, a song penned by George Harrison's fellow Travelling Wilburies, Tom Petty and Jeff Lynn. Why have they not lodged a suite for plagiarism?

But then it seems that sampling, if not outright blatant copying of songs is now the musical norm. I'm thinking of Ice, Ice Baby versus Under Pressure or I'll Be Missing You versus Every Breath You Take. Did the music world change at some point and just become a free for all?

 

[Brian G Turner]

I don't think anyone's questioning composer vs performer rights. Though not everyone will be aware of them.

What I found especially interesting is how the internet is changing the royalties scene for music.

Not least as the music industry seems to be about 5-10 years ahead of the publishing industry when it comes to the internet, in significant ways (DRM!).

 

[Stephen Palmer]

But then it seems that sampling, if not outright blatant copying of songs is now the musical norm. I'm thinking of Ice, Ice Baby versus Under Pressure or I'll Be Missing You versus Every Breath You Take. Did the music world change at some point and just become a free for all?

The originators of those songs will have got a hefty pay packet for allowing them to be sampled.

 

[Stephen Palmer]

Not least as the music industry seems to be about 5-10 years ahead of the publishing industry when it comes to the internet, in significant ways (DRM!).

Agreed. 10 years, I've often thought.

 

[Brian G Turner]

Google are still threatening indie labels:
BBC News - YouTube to block indie labels as subscription service launches

Hope the artists affected will be showcased on another TV site, and people can move to there.

Google really are practised at screwing people over.

 

[J Riff]

This extends all the way down to the ground, has for years.
You absolutely cannot make a living from music, no matter how talented or how hard you work. It has been totally co-opted.
Right down to the local clubs and venues.... past about age 20-something, s'gotta be the worst, the lowest, the Dark Ages for musicians.
(beeping sounds and talking over drum machine patterns not included in def. of music)

 

[JoanDrake]

This extends all the way down to the ground, has for years.
You absolutely cannot make a living from music, no matter how talented or how hard you work. It has been totally co-opted.
Right down to the local clubs and venues.... past about age 20-something, s'gotta be the worst, the lowest, the Dark Ages for musicians.
(beeping sounds and talking over drum machine patterns not included in def. of music)

I dunno, I've yet to figure how Justin Beiber made 130 mill.


And while it used to require a band, an agent and sleeping with several Decca execs just to get published nowadays you can make a Broadway production with a cell phone

 

[J Riff]

When you see that little !$!$!# in the news - for dope or other nonsense... be aware, it's the only way to get his face in the paper in the US or elsewhere, it's deliberate.
None of these pop types have any connection whatsoever with the surviving real musicians.
The huge MTV (?) helicopter hovered over our heads for an hour or two the other night, some award ceremony I guess... and I reckon they burned off more money in gas than the lot of us earn in a year.

 

[Dave]

The originators of those songs will have got a hefty pay packet for allowing them to be sampled.

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/3f60...rred-lines-has-precedents-beatles-vanilla-ice
This is a late reply, but I read this report in the News today concerning Blurred Lines, and as you can see, the originators of those other songs did get a hefty pay packet, though some had to use the courts. Sam Smith apparently didn't even blink, but when I first heard that song it was fairly obviously ripped off.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

USA Radio stations DO NOT pay performing royalties properly.