who to talk to

[60's Bluesman]

my band and i have be throwing this idea around of taking the instrumentaly parts of a couple of songs, rewrite and rename them and put them on our first album. thing is none of us knows where to get the permission from to do that. who should i contact? the artist we are look at right now are david bowie, willie nelson and the beatles.

 

[XigXag]

Google 'finding copyright holders' will give you more options. The first result is from copylaw.com. Link Removed
I've never had a reason to do so, so I dont know from firsthand.

What do you mean by 'taking the instrumentaly parts of a couple of songs, rewrite and rename them'. Im not sure I understand what you're going to do there.

 

[Fetusyolk]

so you're a cover band that does spin-offs of famous songs?

 

[60's Bluesman]

so you're a cover band that does spin-offs of famous songs?

we have original stuff too just not enough to fill a album

 

[Febs]

You'll need to get "mechanical licenses" for any copyrighted songs that you plan to record. Most of the time, you can get the license from the Harry Fox Agency:

[This invalid link has been removed]

If HFA does not administer the license for a particular song, you'll need to track down the rights-holder.