Carol Kaye and why we need help protecting our stuff....

[fbny71]

This page can't be "friended", only liked - but it seems like it's the most active of the bunch.


This page seems inactive but I'll befriend it anyway.

Thanks.

I friended Carol Kaye and Liked Carol Kaye II. This one certainly is more active.

 

[electracoyote]

You can actually copyright a bassline.

Then the question is: Does she hold a copyright on her basslines? Did she file?

If so, and this can be proven to be her intellectual property, the courts reward copyright holders when someone uses their works without permission or compensation all the time. Surely a musician of Carol's experience knows about this and who she could contact to get some clear answers about the compensation due her work.

If she does not hold copyright documents on her basslines, then she was probably awarded a performance royalty or payment, which is a whole 'nother subject treated far differently than copyright.

 

[fbny71]

TR, I am one of the inquiring minds; are you boycotting or not? =)

+1

 

[packhowitzer]

Also, I am no officially declaring war on rap and sampling.

Inquiring minds want to know ... are you missing a "w" or a "t"?

So which is it? Are you NOT declaring war or NOW declaring war?

From your context it sounds like you're declaring war. If so, I say good.

 

[Roy Vogt]

This is precisely why I got in a flame war about a year ago with some people who thought it was totally cool to upload her books and methods on Bit Torrent servers and pirate everything. Turning someone's hard earned work (in this case her books and methods) into easily stolen and duplicated items on some pirate/bit torrent site because you want to save $25 can have unintended consequences.....
As far as the Rap "Artist" I wish for him a manager, attorney and accountant with his sense of ethics and Suge Knight as his Label President. Maybe he'll be asking if you want fries with that shake sooner or later-and for real!
I'm going to check with the Musicians Union here. If a significant amount of the track has been sampled the players may actually be due a Master Session on that (that is, if the original recording was done under a Union contract). So, it would be like using an Oldie in a current movie. A lot of older Session Musicians collect on those sorts of reuse.

 

[Depth_Charge]

Interesting read. No harm in requesting. Let's see if I'm added (you can't send msg's to explain etc)

Either way I'm in the market for some new resources to elevate my playing and am glad I stumbled across this thread.

 

[rosanne]

Friended and Liked. She was always friendly when I wrote her, and had a kind word for me when I needed one.

 

[LM Bass]

Just shared her webpage info on Facebook, and will re-buy some materials to give to my students. I learned from her books back in 1978 when I started playing, and they are still great!
Laurence

 

[TRichardsbass]

So which is it? Are you NOT declaring war or NOW declaring war?

From your context it sounds like you're declaring war. If so, I say good.

I didn't notice I fat fingered that.

I AM OFFICIALLY DECLARING WAR AGAINST RAP! EVERYTIME I HEAR SOMETHING THAT IS OBVIOUSLY LIFTED I WILL CONTACT THE LABEL AND ARTIST AND LET THEM KNOW. I STARTED YESTERDAY!

As for Carol, yes, its not strictly copyright issues, its royalty issues.

As for the comment about money management, Carol is NOT Sly Stone. He wasted it all. Carol purchased a home and as you can see put $180K in it. In this market, with stocks plummeting, 401Ks losing not just interest but principal, and the industry itself selling fewer and fewer CDs a lot of these studio kats are seeing significant decreases in their incomes.

I have old royalty agreements that specifically are drawn against "units sold", and the labels and industry have yet to define a digital download as a " unit sold."

So, its pretty easy to see. You could manage your income well, and expect a certain return on your royalties, only to have them disappear completely because the labels are no longer manufacturing actual vinyl, CD or similar.

At Carol's age and her current living situation, a difference of a couple of hundred dollars a month can make a huge difference.

As for the comment about 10K sessions at $450, it wasn't nearly that lucrative in the '60s. You could live well, but not huge. And there are a lot of these studio guys here in NJ who don't live that well anymore. I live near several. If they didn't own their houses outright they would be in deep, deep do do. Imagine if you made a livable retirement income only to have to purchase or rent a new residence. Your outlay would immediately double, but your income stays the same.

I'm not going to say that there aren't some issues with money management that could have helped, but again, Carol has never been one to live high on the hog nor live like a rockstar. Modest home. Gives lessons and makes some appearances.

So, here's to supporting Carol AND my new war on RAP!

 

[TRichardsbass]

This is precisely why I got in a flame war about a year ago with some people who thought it was totally cool to upload her books and methods on Bit Torrent servers and pirate everything. Turning someone's hard earned work (in this case her books and methods) into easily stolen and duplicated items on some pirate/bit torrent site because you want to save $25 can have unintended consequences.....
As far as the Rap "Artist" I wish for him a manager, attorney and accountant with his sense of ethics and Suge Knight as his Label President. Maybe he'll be asking if you want fries with that shake sooner or later-and for real!
I'm going to check with the Musicians Union here. If a significant amount of the track has been sampled the players may actually be due a Master Session on that (that is, if the original recording was done under a Union contract). So, it would be like using an Oldie in a current movie. A lot of older Session Musicians collect on those sorts of reuse.

Thanks Roy! The master sessions is clearly what I believe is the biggest issue, and is part of what is effecting Carol and others.

Whatever you find, please post here to educate the younger ones. I'm with you and as you can see on a few threads here I've been ranting about bit torrent and P2P for these reasons.

I am not going to reveal the specific artist (although I did rile his label quite a bit and also pointed out to them other songs in their catalogue that clearly cross the bounds, resulting in a testy calll from their lawyer) as this is my war on all piracy, stealing, sharing, and my fight to make sure people understand copyright and other protections.

Please send my regards to Dave Pomeroy and all the boys and girls at the Nashville Local.

Tom, Local 399

 

[electracoyote]

So, here's to supporting Carol

+1, and thanks for bringing this to our attention.

I own a stack of Carol's teaching materials. Profound to say the least, great stuff for the practical and practicing musician. This woman has probably forgotten more about playing bass than I'll ever know.

It would be cool to have her show up on a few more hits in her lifetime, and I hope she gets the credit and compensation she deserves for her work, past, present, and future.

Good music business attorneys have a way of straightening these things out.

 

[madbassplaya]

To be honest, I had never heard of Carol before joining TB. After reading several threads about her and checking out her website it seems that she has problems with people stealing her work all the time.

Even Google is ripping her off?

Please do not download any of my books/CDs from Google. I filed FTC Complaint #25172648 against Google for those illegal downloads, don't be a pirate!
Thank-you, CK

 

[joshmat]

Friend requested and fanned the community page with the most hits. I think trying to purchase books/DVD's/CD's from her as directly as possible may be the easiest and most efficient way to help Carol out. Looks like you can buy everything right from her website, The Official Carol Kaye Web Site.

Big thanks to Tom for putting this out here! When I first saw this thread I was thinking, "oh gosh, I hope this isn't a Carol bashing thread". I love her work!

 

[jbednarski]

Man this really breaks my heart. There are so many people needing help these days. Just bought 2 book/CD combos from here site. If the entire talkbass community pitches in here we can make a difference. Some of the books are only $7.00! Please contribute!

 

[DWBass]

This is why I can't stand hip-hop. Imagine my surprise when I heard Sugarhill Gang's "Rapper's Delight" and then Chic's "Good Times" as a teenager and went, "Huh...??!" It's not even "sampling," it's just blatant stealing.

Listen closely! Not 'exactly' the same although the intent is still there. I have not heard about any legal action from Nile Rogers so either he got paid or didn't give a crap!

 

[Rocker949]

This is a tragedy. I think it's despicable that someone that has played on as many hits as she has can't even make her house payments. Shame on an industry that allows this to happen to the Kayes and Jamersons of the world. At least the greed machines that were recording studios and record companies are all dead or dying. Good riddance!

+1

 

[willgroove2]

I have done a bunch of work in the Hip hop world and one of the trends over the last 5 years or so is less and less sampling because of the rising cost of getting tracks cleared,replay's are very common as they have a different royalty structure than sampling the master recording.


Now Carols situation is horrible,she like many Sr's is faced with diminishing income compounded by the rising cost of living BUT IMO unless she was a credited writer or copyright holder she did sessions and played basslines and got paid..........that's it.Many of the thing's we are discussing didn't exist when she was active,Sampling,digital distribution etc and,as much as it pains me to say,the pioneers of the recording scene are not usually covered by newer agreements in the record industry.

 

[kesslari]

Unfortunately, the music business eats its young, and always has.
I am sad for Carol. That sucks and is profoundly stressful.
I like some of the ideas here for helping get her income in gear and will probably do a few.

 

[THand]

I already bought her materials a couple of years ago...I don't think she'll take a handout.
Maybe I'll buy it again and have it sent to someone else. idk.
Been there. It sucks.

 

[Alkali Ike]

In some Perfect World, a Sting or McCartney or someone of that stature would leverage their influence and see to it that her unfortunate situation is somehow alleviated. Wouldn't it be great if American Idol would do like they did with Bob Babbitt and get Carol up there on stage to play along with one of the contestants, or better, with the band for an entire show. And why isn't Carol in the R&R Hall of Fame or getting some kind of Lifetime Achievement award or something? My god if you look at her discography, even throwing out the disputed tracks, her contributions to the music biz are mind boggling. Every major label could quietly chip in some kind of anonymous assistance to her and they would never even miss it and it would mean the world to her.