BigRedX

The "systems" merely distribute the songwriting royalties according to the wishes of the songwriters and their publishing contract(s). Any "injustice" has nothing to do with them. Since both other members of the Police have song writing credits and co-credits for song songs on all the albums (mostly on the less good songs - so it is obvious what a talented songwriter Sting was at the time), we can only assume that at the time of writing the guitar riff wasn't considered important enough to the overall sound of the song to warrant Andy Summers getting credit. Also it's not as though he was a young naive musician at the time, and didn't realise the importance of getting a writing credit. What did surprise me was how few credits Stuart Copeland gets; I would have thought that with his brother managing the band he would have been able to negotiate better split for himself at least. This is why anyone who thinks they are contributing a major part to the writing of a song should insist that their contribution is recognised. And also why for the last 30 years every originals band I have been in, has split all the writing credits equally between the members of the band at the time the song was written. That was there are no disagreements, especially over the choice of which songs to record and release, since whatever we choose everyone benefits equally.

I always thought that part of Fender's USP was that they were less expensive than their main US-based competition - Gibson (and to a certain extent Rickenbacker). That was certainly my perception of them in the early to mid 70s.

Written by a man who never learned to drive.

Has he never changed his bass strings before?

For those who don't subscribe to the Torygraph, could you give us the gist of the article?

And probably at the time was a nice little earner from his "day job". I suspect that he would have been in and out of the studio in under an hour, for which £15 isn't a bad deal today let alone in 1970 when the recording took place.

In that particular case only. Most of the time if you are hired as a session musician, you are there simply to play. And get paid a one-off fee simply for playing.

Which AFAICS is entirely Andy Summer's fault for not asking for a share of the songwriting on that particular song in the first place. There are other songs on the album (and other Police albums) that he is credited or co-credited as writing. At the time of writing it probably wasn't immediately noticeable what an important part of the song the guitar was going to be. After all traditionally songwriting credits go to the lyricist and whoever come up with the vocal melody. Not that this arrangement is applicable these days. Every band works in a different way when it comes to songwriting credits. Some split everything equally between all the members of the band regardless of who wrote what, others only credit those who come up with the lyrics and main musical idea; and any possible combination in-between.

Artists make little money from Spotify because they have signed contracts that gives their record label the lion's share of the royalties. I've just checked my Spotify payments and I'm generally making about 0.5p per stream, but then as a member of a band without a record deal I'm only getting a fraction of the plays.

One of my bands has made the decision that each song we record will be released individually as a single. Maybe once we have released enough for an album we'll do a one as a physical release (either on vinyl or CD). We have found that this approach has worked much better in terms of growing our fan base, and also it turns out that our most popular song to date was one that had it been an album track would most likely have been tucked away half-way through "side two" where it would have been mostly ignored.

And from the PoV of a business owner every customer is equally important, and you simply never know when an initial enquiry one day will lead to them being you biggest and most important customer a year down the line. That's certainly been the case for me on more than one occasion, and why I ensure that every email gets a reply with in 24 hours and ideally within the hour, even if it's just to say I'm looking into it.

S036 - brilliant! Who's actually in Crass these days? Apart from Steve Ignorant they were all getting on a bit when I saw them in 1980!

Conveniently doesn't show any of the details (like the neck plate and back of the machine heads) that would help track down exactly what it is.

I believe he wrote the actual notes (and came up with the idea of doubling up the Upright bass and bass guitar), but what he did would have been created to fit the song Lou Reed had already written, and there may not have been any indication at the tracking stage how prominent that bass part was ultimately going to be. This was often the case when playing sessions and should have been reflected in his session fee. If you want a cut of the song writing royalties then it need to be negotiated before you even play a note, and hope that you don't get dropped for another player. Edit: and IIRC he doubled up the the bass parts specifically so he could charge double the session fee for playing two instruments, which meant that he was completely aware that his contribution was simply a session payment only.

Was the possibility of a percentage ever on the table? Most of these cases the musician(s) in question were paid their session fee which they happily accepted. Job done on to the next session. I've always said that if you want to earn money after the fact then you need to be a songwriter.

The problem with a telephone conversation is that there is no record of it having taken place unless both parties record it (which has its own separate set of privacy problems). That's the last thing you want when trying to resolve a problem. Form personal experience with BD I would want a full record of everything that has been done for any order over £25.00. I certainly wouldn't want to buy a bass (or have a problem with one resolved) from just a phone call. As someone who runs their own business my position has always been (and most of you on here will probably be sick of me saying this) that if you are not prepared to deal with your customers by a particular means of communication, then DON'T PUBLICISE IT! All my customer's emails get answered within 24 hours of them sending it, and usually a lot sooner; even if all I am able to say to a particularly complicated request, is that I am currently working on it and will be back in touch as soon as I have the required information to answer them in full. I have no sympathy, no time, and no business to give to companies who cannot respond in a timely manner using a method of communication that they have published.

There you go. agedhorse has answered your question perfectly.

As I said in another thread, unless you are strictly a solo player, what makes the bass guitar (or any instrument for that matter) sound good, is how well it works in the overall mix with the other instruments. That sound when solo'd is rarely the sort of sound you would want to spend listening to on its own, but put back all the other instruments and everything sounds fantastic. Science, if you understand it fully can get you to roughly the right sonic space, but ultimately getting the perfect sound for a band/song will require someone with great ears at the controls. Many of my favourite bands feature a musician with an unconventional sound or style and the other instruments often have to be completely re-balanced to make the overall band sound work. And finally from a personal PoV, I play in two bands with different instrumental line-ups. The sounds I use on my Helix for each band are very different, and not at all interchangeable.

It's strange how we tend to spend a lot of time effort and money chasing that "perfect" tone, but if you listen to the many isolated bass guitar tracks from great recordings, you'll rarely hear it. What makes the bass sound good is not how brilliant it sounds on its own but how well the mix engineer has blended it with the other instruments, usually making the solo'd track sound very different to the original recorded sound.

If you do anything "creative" and want to be able to make a living out of it, then unless you are very lucky, you will need to supply what your customers/clients want. Music is no different. I earn my living in a another creative area doing print graphics, and because I want to get paid, I will produce whatever my clients ask for. If I really think that they are wrong I will have one attempt at trying to gently persuade them to go for what I consider to be a better option. However, ultimately I'm not precious about it, and if they are determined then I will give them exactly what they ask for and take their money with a smile and a thank you. If you can do that as a musician, then all power to you. I can't. I find that music is too important for me to produce something I don't believe completely in. I've had a go at it and didn't enjoy it enough for the money I was getting be a suitable substitute. That's just me.

Every bass amp has a baked-in sound. Otherwise there wouldn't be any point in having multiple makes of amp. You pick one with a baked-in sound that you find pleasing.

No backline, everything through the PA and IEMs for the band.

I don't think I've ever seen Humbuckers wired in series in anything. However single coils in roughly the J-Bass positions work very well in series configuration.

More than one pickup is fine (pickup position is one of the few things that can't be accurately replicated with EQ IMO), just don't expect to be able to get a sound that doesn't disappear in the band mix with more than one active at any one time (unless you are running them in series).

And this is exactly the problem with just posting quotes because we don't exactly what you are quoting and what previous post it refers to. It's just lazy arguing. It doesn't show that you have really understood what you are quoting, just you have learned how to copy and paste. Ultimately it adds nothing to the thread and undermines your credibility as someone who is worth listening to. And with that I am done listening to you. You're blocked, so bye bye...