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Looper's Delight
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matthew hahn <esker@mail.utexas.edu> put forth: >I'm also considering bringing in sounds from the television, or live radio >broadcast, maybe I'll just run static, but I wonder if anyone has done >this? And I don't mean U2. I talked this over at length with both some "real" record execs who work with publishing rights, and a pair of friends of mine that hopefully I'll be bringing online soon, Oil Junkys. And it goes like this... If you want to run a recording of, say, Sam Donaldson, talking about Watergate in a1974 after Nixon's resigning, you have to get permission, or someone at some point will come up and demand you pay them. In the above case, ABC would be the ones you'd want to ask through. You might say, "Hey, 1974's more than 20 years ago!", but rebroadcast rights of TV broadcasts are still the property of the original carrier. Brian Eno and David Byrne actually gave us a good lesson in terms of what NOT to do, for once, in "My Life In The Bush With Ghosts," which included recordings of radio broadcasts, but only were described as "slippery politician on political call-in program", or something like that. As a result there is a second pressing of the LP and CD, which not only has the acknowledgements (indicating also that someone else had to get paid in addition to getting credit), but is missing a track "Quran", which includes an apparently forbidden recording of someone reading the Book-in-question. In SOME cases, I'm told, when it comes to using other peoples' recordings/broadcasts, what I call the "ashtray rule" applies. When I used to smoke cigs, I used to collect ashtrays, and early on, my father gave me some valuable advice, perhaps dimly wondering if I swiped them. Well, I was too paranoid to attempt such business, so his advice also enabled me to get more ashtrays... ASK the powers-that-be, either the waiter or the Maitre-d, how much their ashtrays are, because you'd like to take one home. They usually are gratified enough that you ask, that they give you the thing. Similarly, in the case of voice snippets from old broadcasts or film, sometimes individuals and not corporations own the rights, and, in the absence of lawyers-as-middlemen, such an agreement can suffice on paper. The only thing is, Don't just get radio broadcast rights for the snippets. Get PERFORMANCE rights too while you're at it, as it'll be a lot cheaper. What if you make money on the recording you make, but, now that your source knows it, has the right to ask for a percentage, or something, higher than what was negotiated before? It happens. So get 'em both at the outset, and you won't be possibly prevented from performing something that people want to hear. Regarding U2, remember whose idea was the basis for Zoo TV after all... Brian Eno. I just found it unfortunate and yet more incongruous for a band that, frankly, would have just been merely pretentious. And would have preferred that they never use it, since milllions of otherwise-unexposed people were suddenly thinking that Bono/U2 had created the idea on their own. Stephen Goodman * It's... The Loop Of The Week (this week, Phil Hartman)! EarthLight Studios * http://www.earthlight.net/Studios