The misunderstandings about sampling that have been flying around my social media pages lately has reached a level I cant ignore. Id like to clear a few points up for aspiring career producers who want the long-established and unfortunate facts on the subject: 1. I love sampling and have never criticized the practice. My biggest records (Jeezy, 50 Cent, The Game/Jadakiss...) have been sample-based. Working with session players or making all original music is also fun. Sometimes Ill joke about not needing to sample because I work with talented instrumentalists (Memory, Stacktrace, Antman Wonder). Some people have taken that to mean that I hate sampling. Im sampling a beat right now. Id never tell people to stop sampling, but if you want to turn your love for music into a living, you must arm yourself with knowledge. 2. Producers arent responsible for clearing samples themselves when it comes to working with major labels. The labels handle this, but it still costs the producer in the long run, see points 2-4. For smaller independent releases/mixtapes, I actually discourage artists from clearing samples (but dont take legal advice from me as Im not a lawyer). I have a Youtube video on the subject. 3. Sampling a beat will affect your publishing share of a track (essentially your ownership of a song-- learn about publishing, its the most important part of the music business), which means you may not generate a cent of publishing royalties or mechanical royalties off of a song youve produced regardless of how many radio plays it gets, how many times it is licensed by film and tv... I think this is completely unfair to producers (artists still get their share of the $). Producers who rap have it better because even if they lose their composers share of the publishing, they likely retain their writers share. 4. Labels charge producers for sample clearance and that is generally around 10-20 thousand dollars depending on the song you sampled. That amount is recouped against your sales royalties. That means you have to pay the labels back that clearance fee (in the form of your cut of the sales royalties) before you get another check from them. Young Jeezys The Recession sold over a million and it still wasnt enough to pay back the sample + additional expenses the label stuck me with. I share my experiences with the business in hopes others will learn from my mishaps. 5. Keeping points 2 and 3 in mind, that means if you make a sample-based beat and sell it to a major label, you will probably never see any money from it beyond the advance (unless the record does phenomenally well). Every deal is different, but unfortunately, a lot of times this is how it goes down. Now that record sales are struggling, producers are losing out more and more. 6. Do not believe the popular myth about the 6 second rule. All samples must be reported to the labels if you sell them a beat. If you want to read a bunch of boring but informative legal information about the de minimis and fair use laws and how they relate to sampling, heres a great resource: scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1343&context=wmlr 7. Educate yourself and dont ever stop learning about your career field. I have some videos on sample clearance, etc. on my Youtube page (but I certainly dont know everything, not even close), but understanding intellectual property/publishing is the key to prosperity in the music industry. There are lots of books, forums, videos, conferences out there for you to learn from. And if you end up getting a major placement, have a lawyer on hand. Much success to you all, P1
Posted on: Wed, 04 Jun 2014 23:10:00 +0000
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