Protecting your music

[subopposite]

Hello all. So, there is a drummer from another band that wants us to lay down some tracks with him. We are an all originals band and we don't want someone to steal our music. He has a semi-recording studio. We did have a drummer, but got rid of him. The new drummer we want to record with will make us sound sooo much better and we want to get our stuff with a quality recording.
How do I protect our music from this drummer in case he wants to attempt to steal it and use it for another band that he plays with. He says he is into recording now more as he is older, but maybe this is a ploy to get some kind of rights to our songs.
Do we need to get our songs copyrighted. How do we go about this? I just want copyright, not pay a company to redistribute our music and pay us a piddly download thing as they scrape in the real profits. Just want it so no one else can steal our music. We made it, it's ours....at least the bass, guitar and lyrics...he can own the drum part and would be happy to include him in that part of the process and give him his credit. Thanks all.

 

[AwkwardLoudness]

First of all, write up a studio session contract agreement(s) and have every involved sign it....if everyone agrees to the terms. Do this before recording anything. You could get an attorney involved with the contract language if it's that important to you and you're willing to pay an attorney. A contract drafted without an attorney is cheaper and WAAYYY better than no contract at all. The specific recording dates and song titles should be referenced in any studio session contracts.

You could submit rougher demo recordings to the U.S. Copyright Office prior to recording the same songs in the drummer's studio. There are some modest fees involved.

U.S. Copyright Office

These steps will provide documentation in case legal action or other disputes arise in the future.

Disclosure: I am not an attorney...never will be. Force majeure. Proceed at your own risk. Bulls*** can still happen.

 

[Music Attorney]

Hello all. So, there is a drummer from another band that wants us to lay down some tracks with him. We are an all originals band and we don't want someone to steal our music. He has a semi-recording studio. We did have a drummer, but got rid of him. The new drummer we want to record with will make us sound sooo much better and we want to get our stuff with a quality recording.
How do I protect our music from this drummer in case he wants to attempt to steal it and use it for another band that he plays with. He says he is into recording now more as he is older, but maybe this is a ploy to get some kind of rights to our songs.
Do we need to get our songs copyrighted. How do we go about this? I just want copyright, not pay a company to redistribute our music and pay us a piddly download thing as they scrape in the real profits. Just want it so no one else can steal our music. We made it, it's ours....at least the bass, guitar and lyrics...he can own the drum part and would be happy to include him in that part of the process and give him his credit. Thanks all.

It’s always a good idea to copyright your musical compositions, but that is far from any sort of guarantee or real protection. I'm pretty sure I've posted on what registration does and doesn't do. Try a search and then let me know if you still have questions.

As far as "protecting" your songs, my suggestion is that you have the drummer sign something along the lines of:

<Insert Drummer’s full name>(“Drummer”) warrants and represents that neither Drummer nor any party engaged by Drummer contributed to the authorship of the musical compositions embodied in the recordings of the group professionally known as <insert name of your band>(the “Masters”). Accordingly, neither Drummer nor any party engaged by Drummer shall make any claim or demand in connection with such musical compositions (including payment or ownership of any kind).

When you say “he can own his drum part,” do you mean you plan to give him a copyright interest in the recordings? Can he license the recordings without your permission? Is he entitled to a share of all income generated by the exploitation of the recordings? Can he assign/sell his ownership interest to someone else?

Best,
MA

 

[Music Attorney]

A contract drafted without an attorney is cheaper and WAAYYY better than no contract at all.

God bless you for saying that. I love it when people make suggestions that ensure my continued employment ;-)

When it comes to talent-based services agreements like producer agreements, management agreements, recording agreements, etc., it is almost always going to be better to have no contract at all. For example, a manager is the person who will receive almost all of the benefit from having a written agreement. Similarly, it would be most advantageous to an artist if they can get a record company to put out records without a signed agreement. A record producer can gain some serious leverage if the records they produced are being released by an artist that didn't get a producer agreement in place first (i.e., if the artist has to come back and say "hey, my record company says I need you to sign this"). And so on.

Obviously, if there are oral discussions about financial and other important terms (or emails), then it complicates things a little, but there are many, many situations where I encourage my clients to work without a contract.

Best,
MA

 

[BritPicker]

I think you are being paranoid. I've never heard of a drummer or anyone else "stealing" anyone else's songs.

Any decent muso, and especially one who wants to get into session or paid work has far better things to do than try to pass others work off as his/her own.

The only time this really ever seems to happen is when it's two main songwriters in a band who really do write together.. then it's an argument about relative contributions rather than outright theft.

Many young bands seem to get mightily concerned about protecting their copyrights, sending themselves tapes/cd's and manuscripts through the post or putting it in a bank vault or whatever. IMHO they are wasting their time that could be better spent practicing, writing or getting better gigs.

I once knew a guy who had all his songs 'witnessed' and the sealed away in special storage, so paranoid was he. It cost him a lot of money. And his songs were pants!

 

[twocargar]

Thanks for the link. I'm gonna hijack the thread if you don't mind. What about joining ASCAP or BMI? My band is getting ready to put some of our work online for public consumption. After copyrighting, should we publish our work as well?

Thanks,

TCG

First of all, write up a studio session contract agreement(s) and have every involved sign it....if everyone agrees to the terms. Do this before recording anything. You could get an attorney involved with the contract language if it's that important to you and you're willing to pay an attorney. A contract drafted without an attorney is cheaper and WAAYYY better than no contract at all. The specific recording dates and song titles should be referenced in any studio session contracts.

You could submit rougher demo recordings to the U.S. Copyright Office prior to recording the same songs in the drummer's studio. There are some modest fees involved.

U.S. Copyright Office

These steps will provide documentation in case legal action or other disputes arise in the future.

Disclosure: I am not an attorney...never will be. Force majeure. Proceed at your own risk. Bulls*** can still happen.

 

[TRichardsbass]

God bless you for saying that. I love it when people make suggestions that ensure my continued employment ;-)

When it comes to talent-based services agreements like producer agreements, management agreements, recording agreements, etc., it is almost always going to be better to have no contract at all. For example, a manager is the person who will receive almost all of the benefit from having a written agreement. Similarly, it would be most advantageous to an artist if they can get a record company to put out records without a signed agreement. A record producer can gain some serious leverage if the records they produced are being released by an artist that didn't get a producer agreement in place first (i.e., if the artist has to come back and say "hey, my record company says I need you to sign this"). And so on.

Obviously, if there are oral discussions about financial and other important terms (or emails), then it complicates things a little, but there are many, many situations where I encourage my clients to work without a contract.

Best,
MA

Not normal that I agree with someone with their JD, but I do in a way here.

Easiest thing to do, and you should do it anyway, is submit your songs as they are now for copyright. It does not guarantee ultimate protection, but it at least gives you some legal leverage should anything have to go to court.

Then I would have a simple agreement signed by the drummer stating that he can't use, distribute, perform or re-record the material without your consent. My guess is that the drummer will not be wanting to steal your music, but if he agrees to this should you need to go to court it carries weight.

Then, don't sweat it. If you like his drum parts and your songs are better, then he will automatically become part of the song, but not the whole song. Its his "performance" that he can claim, as the song has already been written and recorded and his contribution would be a different drum track, not a complete creation of the drum track.

I'm no lawyer like MA (although I seem to play one here on TB a lot ) but I think if you are worried and you do these things you will be about as protected as you can be.