Blake Morgan, and so many of us, have been battling for artists rights. We are winning! Here is a chance to add your voice. Tomorrow, Sunday, February 8th 7pm on Twitter #IRespectMusic
A Huge Win for The Turtles and Songwriters everywhere! I rarely reblog an entire article, (in fact I never have), however this one was so exciting for songwriters and artists as a whole. Have a read! Special thank you’s to Blake Morgan, David Cloyd, Chris Castle, California Congress and, of course everyone at MusicTechPolicy! Congratulations to our friend Howard Kaylan and The Turtles!!! And click to sign the petition on #IRespectMusic.org!
Score Round One for the Duke, the Count and Satchmo–Flo & Eddie pka The Turtles have won a crushing victory over Sirius XM requiring Sirius to license and pay royalties for Flo & Eddie’s recordings published before 1972. Sirius had taken the position that because the Congress did not expressly include pre-1972 recordings when it established the performance right for sound recordings in 1995, Sirius did not have to pay royalties on pre-72 recordings it used on its service. This is a position held by Pandora and the Digital Media Association which includes Google among its membership. More about that later.
The case was brilliantly argued for Flo & Eddie by Henry Gradstein and Harvey Geller, two long time artist advocates (the firm is also representing Aimee Mann in her lawsuit against MediaNet). The theory is actually very simple, even biblical–thou shalt not steal. But then I’m an Old Testament kind of guy.
However, the case is based on a complex set of legal principles that need to be mastered and presented just so in order to prevail. Because Flo & Eddie managed to get back ownership of their masters years ago, they were able to bring the case themselves without any record company involvement. (After the artists led the way, the major labels also sued Sirius.) And Gradstein and Geller made a very effective and compelling argument to the Court that resulted in victory, a victory that will be available to artists and copyright owners everywhere seeking to correct the “Pandora loophole.”
Not only will this defeat for Sirius, Pandora and DiMA be encouraging to artists wishing to take action, it also provides what must be a tremendous sense of satisfaction to the sponsors of the RESPECT Act (HR 4772), introduced by Rep. George Holding and Rep. John Conyers. The cosponsors are a bipartisan group seeking to right the wrong of the Pandora loophole: Reps. Coble, Blackburn, Chu, Cooper, Deutch, Gohmert, Jeffries, Peterson, Rangel, Lowenthal, Collins, Rooney and Fincher.
The Pandora loophole is an effort to justify denying artists their right to satellite radio and webcasting royalties by playing with dates. Those dates are 1972, 1995 and 1998. (In Flo and Eddie’s California case, another date was 1982.) 1972 is important because that was the first year that Congress extended the federal copyright law to sound recordings. Before 1972, sound recordings are governed by state common law, sometimes included statutes as is the case in California that has an extensive state copyright act directly on point as one might expect. 1995 is important because that was the year that Congress established a limited public performance right in sound recordings transmitted digitally (including satellite radio and webcasting) and 1998 is important because that was the year that Congress fleshed out the law that established the compulsory license under Section 114(g), the royalty rate setting and put the finishing touches on establishing SoundExchange.
The Pandora loophole is some version of this argument: Because state law applies to pre-72 sound recordings and because Congress did not intend to extend the performance right to sound recordings in 1995, pre-72 artists and copyright owners (as well as the non featured singers and musicians) get none of the royalties established in 1998 under the compulsory license. But here’s the truly weird part: Sirius rejected the safety of the compulsory license established in 1998 to commercialize the limited performance rights established in 1995 in favor of no license at all under state law.
Yes, that’s right: Grown men thought this was a good idea.
The case boils down to a very simple concept: California has a carefully crafted state copyright law that the Court ruled includes the public performance right (and does not exclude it):
The Court finds that copyright ownership of a sound recording under § 980(a)(2) [the California copyright statute] includes the exclusive right to publicly perform that recording. See Cal. Civ. Code § 980(a)(2). Accordingly, the Court GRANTS summary judgment on copyright infringement in violation of §980(a)(2) in favor of Flo & Eddie.
The point–and one made recently by David Lowery–is that there is no language in either the California state law or in the 1995 amendment to the federal Copyright Law that excludes public performance royalties for pre72 recordings. So the RESPECT Act can be thought of as almost a technical amendment to fix this Pandora loophole.
Neither Pandora nor Sirius exactly trumpet to their users the fact that these companies are using the pre-72 recordings in multiple channels to their profit–but none of the fees paid by fans ever gets to the artists. Pandora even misappropriates the artist’s name in the music genome and uses association with artists by name in order to sell their service–and that’s not covered by the compulsory license, either. (And neither is the derivative work created by the music genome–but that’s another lawsuit.)
So you have to ask yourself–what were they thinking? Wouldn’t it have been better if Sirius really wanted to stiff old guys and dead cats that they paid the royalties and sought declaratory relief before cutting off America’s musical treasures?
Pandora and Sirius have a chance now to openly reject the bad advice they got (apparently from DiMA) and start paying on pre-72 IMMEDIATELY. Throw their support behind the RESPECT Act. Disassociate themselves from DiMA, CCIA, CES or whoever is giving them this horrible advice that it’s worth the downside liability risk and yet more bad PR to “save” a few bucks and stiff Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Neil Young and so many greats who are responsible for putting American music on the map.
But if past behavior is any prediction of future action, they won’t. You get into these scrapes by being pig-headed, and you can’t waive a magic wand and make a pig into something else. You can fire them, however.
And when Wall Street gets a load of the level of liability that these companies have taken on without a care in the world, the reaction will be interesting.
Apparently Pandora’s CFO would like Pandora to be a better partner to artists. That’s easy.
All he has to do is act like it.
Save The Turtles: The Turtles Greatest Hits Original recording remastered click to order on Amazon!
As a kid, I was always singing. I’d sit with a pencil and my small plastic record player. They looked like the Crosley Player to the left and came in colors, with a handle for simple carrying to outlets around the house or to a friends place. There is nothing like vinyl. The textures sounds, the feeling that you are in the same room with the artist. It’s like being there. The sound is full spectrum. Not like what one downloads on an MP3 now. Kids today don’t realize they are missing so much of the true sound of a recording.
I’d move the needle methodically, writing down every word. We didn’t have any other way of finding the song lyrics ….waaay….back then. Then I’d, hop on the bed a start singing at the top of my lungs. Once I had every word memorized, of course, there was the mirror with my hairbrush microphone.
So, geek that I am, this is the kind of thing I do in my spare time. I research a song, finding different takes and isolated tracks of the same song to hear sublties.
So, have a mghty listen to The Beatles: “I Feel Fine”. Listen to the textures, the harmonies… the subtle sounds and layers. Something tells me you too will feel fine…
“”I Feel Fine” is a riff-driven rock song written by John Lennon (credited to Lennon–McCartney) and released in 1964 by the Beatles as the A-side of their eighth British single. The song is notable for being one of the first uses of guitar feedback in popular music. “ – Wikipedia
The Beatles – I Feel Fine (Live at Paris) 1965
The Beatles HD – I Feel Fine Live in Germany (Remastered)
“I Feel Fine” is written in 4/4 time with drummer Ringo Starr’s R&B-influenced beat (based on the “Latin” drumming in Ray Charles’s hit “What’d I Say”) featured through most of the song except for the bridge, which has a more conventional backbeat. After a brief note of heavy feedback (see below), the intro begins with a distinctive arpeggiated riff which starts in D major before quickly progressing to C major and then G major, at which point the vocals begin in G. Just before the coda, Lennon’s intro riff (or ostinato), is repeated with a bright sound by George Harrison on electric guitar (a Gretsch Tennessean), followed by the more “electric” sound of John’s amped acoustic. The song ends with a fadeout of the G major portion of the opening riff repeated several times. – wikipedia
“I Feel Fine” (Lennon–McCartney)
Baby’s good to me, you know
She’s happy as can be, you know
She said so
I’m in love with her and I feel fine
Baby says she’s mine, you know
She tells me all the time, you know
She said so
I’m in love with her and I feel fine
I’m so glad that she’s my little girl
She’s so glad, she’s telling all the world
That her baby buys her things, you know
He buys her diamond rings, you know
She said so
She’s in love with me and I feel fine, mmm
Baby says she’s mine, you know
She tells me all the time, you know
She said so
I’m in love with her and I feel fine
I’m so glad that she’s my little girl
She’s so glad, she’s telling all the world
That her baby buys her things, you know
He buys her diamond rings, you know
She said so
She’s in love with me and I feel fine
She’s in love with me and I feel fine, mmm, mmm
The Beatles “I Feel Fine” Isolated Vocals
The Beatles – I Feel Fine isolated guitar track, guitar only
Below we have some of the studio recorded versions
The Beatles – I Feel Fine (Take 1)
I Feel Fine （Take 5） – The Beatles Rare Takes
I Feel Fine Take 6, 7 / The Beatles
The Beatles (The Original Studio Recordings) Box set, Original recording remastered on Amazon!
10 CC – I’m Not In Love by Joe D’Ambrosio @WatcherOfTheSky and Karen A. Brown @StardustBluCEO for @Indiestardust
This has to be one of my all time favorite tunes. Released in 1975, it hit #2 on the Charts on July 26th 1975 and to me it whispers. It takes you to another diminsional time and carries you away in love. Not to mention the backstory. So, I enlisted my friend Joe D’Ambrosio, who is a 32 year veteran of the music industry, to join me on this one.
Joe writes:
What may seem like an ‘ordinary song’ for most, 10cc’s “I’m Not In Love” was a landmark song for me. Top Ten All Time. The warmth of the vocals, the emotion of it all totally defined in the single line “Be Quiet. Big Boys Don’t Cry. Big Boys Don’t Cry. Big Boys Don’t Cry. (repeat)” gave this 19 year old (at the time-1975) so much more understanding of love and loss, I can’t tell you.
In my mind’s eye, this was not about ‘not’ being in love at all; this was all about being in love:
I’m not in love So don’t forget it It’s just a silly phase I’m going through And just because I call you up Don’t get me wrong, don’t think you’ve got it made
He is absolutely DEEP in love and facing love lost. He’s calling her up and getting no where. Heart b-r-e-a-k-i-ng. And it’s captured so perfectly by Eric, Lol, Graham and Kevin (Stewart, Crème, Gouldman and Godley)that it’s a wonder it wasn’t the biggest hit of the year.
I like to see you But then again That doesn’t mean you mean that much to me So if I call you Don’t make a fuss Don’t tell your friends about the two of us
She won’t make a fuss. You’re lucky if she listens to your message. She’s gone.
I keep your picture Upon the wall It hides a nasty stain that’s lying there So don’t you ask me To give it back I know you know it doesn’t mean that much to me
Madly in love, picture on the wall, trying to talk himself into how little it means…when it means everything to him.
Ooh you’ll wait a long time for me Ooh you’ll wait a long time Ooh you’ll wait a long time for me Ooh you’ll wait a long time
For all of us who have loves lost, I hope you’ve found yours as I have. After all, those loves lost are not waiting for you or me, they’re on to their love found.
“I’m Not In Love” indeed. What a masterwork, which, by the way, comes from one of my very few PERFECT albums: The Original Soundtrack by 10cc.
Exerpt taken from Richard Buskin’s article 2004 “CLASSIC TRACKS: 10cc ‘I’m Not In Love'” “At that time my wife and I had been married about eight years,” Eric Stewart recalls, “and she asked me ‘Why don’t you say “I love you” more often?’ I had this crazy idea in my mind that repeating those words would somehow degrade the meaning, so I told her ‘Well, if I say every day “I love you, darling, I love you, blah, blah, blah,” it’s not gonna mean anything eventually.’ That statement led me to try to figure out another way of saying it, and the result was that I chose to say ‘I’m not in love with you,’ while subtly giving all the reasons throughout the song why I could never let go of this relationship.” Evidently, the reverse psychology worked, because the Stewarts recently celebrated their 39th wedding anniversary.
10cc – I’m Not In Love – Making of Documentary
“I’m not in Love” Live
Joe D’Ambrosio is a 32 year veteran of the music industry and currently runs his talent mgmt company representing Tony Visconti – Hugh Padgham – Elliot Scheiner – Joe Zook – Frank Filipetti – Kevin Killen – Jay Newland – Rob Mounsey – Larry Gold – Thom Monahan – Lawrence Manchester – Adam Dorn – Dave Eggar – Mario McNulty – Eric Robinson – Justin Glasco – Nic Hard – Brian Moncarz – Matty Amendola – Nathaniel Hare – Jason Moss Follow Joe D’Ambrosio on twitter @WatcherOfTheSky
We have something historical in today’s release of Jimmy Page’s mastered remix. The importance of having the original recordings remastered by Jimmy is profound.
Page commented: “This version of ‘Whole Lotta Love’ is the mix down from the night that we recorded it, so it doesn’t have any of the overdubs that everyone will be familiar with, because when they hear this they’ll think, ‘Oh yeah, that’s the original’ and all of a sudden they’ll go ‘No, it’s not.'”
Jimmy Page on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon May, 21st, 2014
From Led Zeppelin II (Deluxe Edition) – Led Zeppelin’s remastered second album will include additional companion audio with unreleased studio outtakes To be released on multiple CD, vinyl, and digital formats as well as a Limited Edition Super Deluxe Box.
The official music video for Led Zeppelin – “Whole Lotta Love (Rough Mix With Vocal)” This title will be released on June 3, 2014.
Jimmy Page talks about performing with Led Zeppelin, how he learned music, influences on his sound and music, and being chosen for an honorary doctorate from Berklee College of Music.
Jimmy Page is a world renowned guitarist, composer, and producer who has twice been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He began his career as a studio session guitarist in London and subsequently became a member of the Yardbirds, in 1966, before founding Led Zeppelin, in 1968. Over the next decade, Led Zeppelin effectively redefined rock music, drawing on a wide range of influences to create a string of legendary albums that have to date sold an estimated 300 million copies. Through his work with Led Zeppelin, Page became recognized as one of the greatest and most versatile guitarists in history. From acoustic ballads to hard rock standards, his use of unconventional scales and tunings, innovative use of electronic effects, and fresh approaches to records and production took the rock genre to a new level. His solo from Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven” is still widely considered the greatest guitar solo of all time, four decades since it was recorded.
Rob Hochschild: interview Filmed by 21summit Productions Joe Barnard: videographer, editor Simon Katz: audio
Led Zeppelin Rem asters Paris Listening Party – Jimmy Page
#RARE Billy Joel on 16 Track! The Lost L.A. Tapes – 1972 #raremusic #music
by Karen A. Brown @IndieStardust @StardustBlueCEO
Larry Russell is a dear friend and when I saw what he had found in his archives I had to share it with you!
These five original songs feature Billy Joel, Larry Russell, Rhys Clark, and Al Hertzberg in 1972! The sessions were recorded in Los Angeles at Paramount Recording Studios on Santa Monica Boulevard shortly after performing at the famous Sigma Studio, which was the concert that got Billy noticed by Columbia Records.
Thank you Larry Russell for supplying these rare recordings!
Interview with Larry Russell: Original Bass player for Billy Joel’s band 1972
KAB: How did you meet Billy and what year was it?
Billy Joel Miami Convention Center April 1st 1972 PHOTO: Susan Geiser
LR: It was early 1967 my band THE AGE OF REASON auditioned to be the opening act in a long island club called MY HOUSE owned by Danny Mazur. His son Irwin would later become Billy’s manager during my tenure. And that’s how it all began; my band opened up for THE HASSLES every Friday and Saturday night for a few months and also shared lots of shows with them outside of the club, like PALISADES AMUSEMENT PARK and HS proms.
Original Billy Joel Band: February 1972 Live at The University of Southern Illinois
KAB: How did you come across these lost recordings? Tell us about all these great original tracks!
LR: I had been looking for this tape for about 2 years now and stumbled across it accidentally, while opening some storage bins. I knew I should digitize it because it was on a cassette that was recorded by a good friend of mine, Alan Diaz, who was present during the sessions in Los Angeles. The engineer took a feed from the board and transferred it into Alan’s little Panasonic mono recorder. That tape was transferred onto another tape that he gave to me and I digitized it in my studio and gave that to the administrator of a great Billy Joel fan forum on Facebook run by pretty cool Billy Joel fan, Mike Stutz. The forum name is called Billy Joel: Completely Retold. the sessions took place in Los Angeles in April 1972 at the Paramount Studios on Santa Monica Boulevard. I believe we recorded there 1 or 2 days in one week to record about six songs. The engineer was the same one who worked with James Taylor on Fire and Rain. I remember those sessions as being a very happy time for us as that was a great momentum for us at that point.
KAB: What was the atmosphere like recording with Billy during this session?
LR: My old drummer bandmate, Alan Diaz. who would later go on to play Sergio Mendez, was attending this session and it was his cassette tape that was used to make the digital transfer of these sessions. The atmosphere was never tense. Between Billy, Rhys and I, there were plenty of ‘NY kidding’ around to keep us loose in the studio. And besides, we had a very successful string of dates that solidified Billy’s future success to come.
Larry Russel Photo by Symie Dahut
KAB: What was the equipment did you guys used to record?
LR: I used a 1972 Fender Prescision Bass that Billy bought me, mostly because my Rickenbacker Bass was getting played out. Al Hertzberg used his new Strat, that Billy bought him, as well. Rhys used his custom kit with Ludwig hardware. And Billy used the studio’s Steinway Grand. The engineer that day was Bill Lazarus, who two years prior engineered James Taylor’s Fire and Rain LP. He was awesome. The room provided him a 16 track Studer. I believe these sessions lasted two to three days.
KAB: Is there anything else you’d like to share with our readers, Larry?
LR: Yes, this band is releasing some live material from our reunion show from last year at The Bitter End on iTunes soon. It is called ‘Long, Long Time’ and look out for us later this year when we mini-tour a few shows down the East Coast.
KAB: Where can folks see you play now?
LR: We are planning an East Coast multi city mini-tour and I will provide info relating to this on Facebook. I am also in the midst of mixing the tracks from our Bitter End Reunion Show from last September 22, 2013 and those tracks will soon be available for sale as a download on iTunes as soon as it is completed.
Thanks for dropping in here with me on Indiestardust Larry! Wonderful hearing these incredible stories!
Find Larry on Twitter @LRussellBass and on Facebook
We all thought this was just a marketing gimmick for Record Store Day and then we saw this! Wow Jack!
Jack White’s World’s Fastest Record RSD Recap!
Sonic 102.9 program director Al Ford stopped by Garner Andrews’s place on his way home from LA to discuss his trip to Jack White’s Third Man Records in Nashville and played the new song, “Lazaretto”.
IndieStardust 