Legalities of being in a covers band…

[Dan Dare]

7 hours ago, fleabag said:

On the other foot,  you will be using a multitude of the venue's  mains sockets.  Is the venue covered for damage to your band's equipment if the 240v sockets go a bit awol ?

 

I carry a socket tester for this reason. They're cheap enough. Have found a couple of sockets where neutral and earth have been reversed over the years.

[Munurmunuh]

7 hours ago, geoham said:

While the country was locked down, my current covers band remotely recorded a cover of a popular song, and put it to a video slide-show of some band photos. It was taken down by YouTube in a matter of hours. We're quite good, but nobody was mistaking this for the original! I was very surprised by this, I didn't think recording a cover would be considered a copyright issue.

 

Who was claiming the copyright infringement? The publishers of the song, or the holders of the rights of the original recording? If the latter you need to appeal, because your recording has nothing to do with them.

 

The automated software is pretty inaccurate. During the lockdowns classical musicians were having their home videos of, eg, 17th century works pulled because of supposed copyright infringements. Clearly this was nonsense.

[DawnPatroller]

36 minutes ago, Ricky Rioli said:

 

Who was claiming the copyright infringement? The publishers of the song, or the holders of the rights of the original recording? If the latter you need to appeal, because your recording has nothing to do with them.

 

The automated software is pretty inaccurate. During the lockdowns classical musicians were having their home videos of, eg, 17th century works pulled because of supposed copyright infringements. Clearly this was nonsense.

 

It's about potentially making money off someone else's work. If you video yourself playing bass along to a song and post it on your Facebook, it will often mute the video after the first ten seconds or pop up a message that says "Are you SURE you want to post this, we know it's not yours?!".

[Woodinblack]

1 hour ago, Ricky Rioli said:

Who was claiming the copyright infringement? The publishers of the song, or the holders of the rights of the original recording? If the latter you need to appeal, because your recording has nothing to do with them.

 

The automated software is pretty inaccurate. 

 

Yes. one of my previous bands videos had a copyright strike by the rights holders of Human Leagues 'Don't you want me baby'. I wouldn't have minded but the song was actually 'Ever fallen in love' by the buzzcocks, and we weren't that bad. I appealed, the strike went away and never heard anything else.

 

 

8 hours ago, Old Horse Murphy said:

It's a real lottery. In all the gigs I've played over the last 10 years or so (well in to the hundreds) apart from one wedding we've never needed PAT testing.

 

We only needed it once for playing the Motor Museum at sparkford. And then noone actually checked.

[geoham]

19 hours ago, Ricky Rioli said:

 

Who was claiming the copyright infringement? The publishers of the song, or the holders of the rights of the original recording? If the latter you need to appeal, because your recording has nothing to do with them.

 

The automated software is pretty inaccurate. During the lockdowns classical musicians were having their home videos of, eg, 17th century works pulled because of supposed copyright infringements. Clearly this was nonsense.

To be honest, I’m not sure. My guitarist dealt with it at the time. We also put the same video on Facebook, and it stayed up, so our followers still got to hear our effort.

 

[Dan Dare]

On 17/12/2021 at 23:02, DawnPatroller said:

It's about potentially making money off someone else's work.

 

True. Strictly speaking, if you perform someone else's song/music and it's still in copyright, you should pay a royalty to the composer, copyright owner et al. Obviously, it's impossible to police or monitor all occasions where this happens and the cost and effort of doing so would not be worth the return. Consequently, effort is directed towards situations where there is some sort of profile, rather than the band playing in the Dog & Duck on Tuesday evening. I'm surprised sometimes when I read my PRS statement and see where payments - often of only pennies - originate.

 

It doesn't matter whether or not there is any financial benefit to the performers. If they are making use of someone's intellectual property, the property owner can pursue a royalty or seek to prevent them from using his/her property. Benefit to the performer is often not financial, in the immediate term, at any rate. It might take the form of pleasing or impressing friends, gaining followers, persuading potential bookers to hire them and so on.

 

The fact that we can and do play music written and owned by others without paying for the privilege does not make it our legal right. It just means nobody has noticed, or that it isn't worth it for the owners to pursue us.

Edited December 19, 2021 by Dan Dare

[ezbass]

Isn’t it down to the venue to do the business regarding PRS? 
 

Not being confrontational, it’s a genuine question based on what little I’ve gleaned on the subject over the years.

[tauzero]

On 17/12/2021 at 16:57, Booooooom said:

We were contacted by a legitimate copyright company representing the owner of a copyrighted image with evidence that we had puplished their clients image without consent, licence and without accreditation. No warning just a payment claim. We removed the image immediately and negotiated a reduced fee. From memory, the image was naively copied from a similar fb post or a basic google search. It wasn’t watermarked and I didn’t consider it was being used illegitemally as we weren’t advertising anything or otherwise making any financial gain. I wondered if anyone had similar experiences?

 

I got an email from someone purporting to be representing someone whose copyright we had infringed with an image on the website. It didn't specify which image or define the copyright holder and the email address it came from bounced when I asked for further details. I haven't changed anything and haven't had any further contact from them.

[PaulWarning]

21 minutes ago, ezbass said:

Isn’t it down to the venue to do the business regarding PRS? 
 

Not being confrontational, it’s a genuine question based on what little I’ve gleaned on the subject over the years.

that's what I understood, the venue buys a PRS license and that's it, haven't a clue how the PRS distribute the monies, only once have we've been asked for our set list for PRS purposes

[Woodinblack]

1 hour ago, PaulWarning said:

that's what I understood, the venue buys a PRS license and that's it, haven't a clue how the PRS distribute the monies, only once have we've been asked for our set list for PRS purposes

 

I assumed they just did a 50/50 split between Kings of Leon and Wilson Picket and figured they had it mostly sorted.

[Lozz196]

When we played in Europe we had to provide a set list of the songs we played to the venues, something to do with copyright/PRS I think (as aside from printing it out I never bothered to really find out why).

Edited December 19, 2021 by Lozz196

[Downunderwonder]

6 hours ago, Dan Dare said:

worth it for the owners to pursue us.

Publishers do it on behalf of artists en masse via the venue licence schemes. It's very much worth their while.

[Dan Dare]

45 minutes ago, Downunderwonder said:

Publishers do it on behalf of artists en masse via the venue licence schemes. It's very much worth their while.

 

I realise that (did you miss the part where I said I'm a PRS member?). However, a lot of smaller venues or ones where music is only performed occasionally, are not licenced. When we play a licenced venue, we are asked to complete a PRS return, listing what we have played. It certainly doesn't happen everywhere.

[BigRedX]

As someone who has mostly played on originals bands, and who always submits a set list for the songs we play, I can recall only one venue played in the last 20 years that was not covered by a PRS licence and that was a house party one of my bands did, and which I didn't bother reporting anyway.

 

 

[Jakester]

On 17/12/2021 at 19:41, la bam said:

Ok, so pli and pat ....

 

You DO need them.

 

 

At the risk of being 'that guy', you don't *need* PAT - it's usually venues insisting on it to check that it's been tested recently, but there's no legal obligation on them, and unless you're employing the other members of your band, not on you either. 

 

The legal obligation stems from an employer's responsibility to ensure equipment used by their employees is safe. They don't even have to have it PAT'd annually, but most do to show they're taking reasonable steps to ensure safety. 

 

That's not to say it isn't a good idea to have your gear tested from time to time, but that's a different point to saying you as a musician are legally obliged to have your gear PAT'd. 

[scalpy]

Been asked for PAT testing a few times- normally hotels, but one venue was particularly officious, more or less suggesting we couldn’t walk through the door without it. This was for a really easy gig as well, two Pa cabs, some monitors and desk, no lights or major backline etc. We were fine anyway but arrived. Nobody asked (as usual) but I was most amused to go and look at all their PAT labels, a minimum of 5 years out of date, mostly lights plugged into sockets you’d see in the 40s. 

[12stringbassist]

Just curious: Which photographer and which image?
Please PM me if you don't want to put the image out there again.

I run www.slayed.co.uk - so this is of some interest to me.

[Bassfinger]

On 19/12/2021 at 18:43, Lozz196 said:

When we played in Europe...

Tell me, is that Joey Tempest's real hair?

[gapiro]

On 17/12/2021 at 14:22, geoham said:

I

 

While the country was locked down, my current covers band remotely recorded a cover of a popular song, and put it to a video slide-show of some band photos. It was taken down by YouTube in a matter of hours. We're quite good, but nobody was mistaking this for the original! I was very surprised by this, I didn't think recording a cover would be considered a copyright issue.

There are two (well actually three) rights when it comes to music.
The first is composing rights - the person who wrote the music, provided it is not in the public domain, owns these and this is almost certainly what youtube will have complained about. This ensures that the person who wrote the music gets paid.  If you perform these live in person in a band, that should be covered by the venue - that is actually usually ASCAP, BMI, SESAC etc in the USA, or in the UK it is PPL PRS 'TheMusicLicense' in most cases.
The second is performance rights - if you want to play, say , Mariah Carey in your bar, you need the rights to the actual performance/recording you are using - this is where PRS comes in. In your youtube video case these would actually be your rights. 
The third is synchronisation license, which is a license that allows you to synchronise the music with some sort of visual art.

You need #1 and #3 to put a video cover on youtube. 
Youtube is sensible though and realises that its not intheir interest to constantly shut everything down - instead they just redirect the money to the creators

Edited December 23, 2021 by gapiro

[gapiro]

On 20/12/2021 at 11:22, Jakester said:

At the risk of being 'that guy', you don't *need* PAT - it's usually venues insisting on it to check that it's been tested recently, but there's no legal obligation on them, and unless you're employing the other members of your band, not on you either. 

 

The legal obligation stems from an employer's responsibility to ensure equipment used by their employees is safe. They don't even have to have it PAT'd annually, but most do to show they're taking reasonable steps to ensure safety. 

 

That's not to say it isn't a good idea to have your gear tested from time to time, but that's a different point to saying you as a musician are legally obliged to have your gear PAT'd. 

Yes, the whole PAT Testing industry is a scam in many cases. The legal requirement is exactly as you say. However, some places (I do a lot of theatre work) have a requirement in their insurance about it - my local city theatre is one that is notorious for it, however, they have 2 or 3 tech staff that are trained to do them and will do it for free if there is time before the event/first show/dress/etc

Personally, I have an electronics degree and a wad of stickers in my gig bag....
 

[gapiro]

On 19/12/2021 at 20:26, Dan Dare said:

 

I realise that (did you miss the part where I said I'm a PRS member?). However, a lot of smaller venues or ones where music is only performed occasionally, are not licenced. When we play a licenced venue, we are asked to complete a PRS return, listing what we have played. It certainly doesn't happen everywhere.

I don't _think_ it is a license requirement to get those PRS returns, but PRS basically just collect all the money and then distribute it based on how popular they _think_ songs are. PRS returns are one of the ways that they determine the popularity, so if you're doing some rare/oddball covers, it does really help the original artist to do a PRS form

[PaulWarning]

you tube have dealt differently with copywrite issues on covers of songs I've put on there, they either don't pick them up, or the original songwriter isn't bothered, Daydream Believer was taken down (with a warning), when I uploaded a version of Mrs Robinson, it said they'd detected that the song was a cover and we wouldn't get any royalties for it, a couple of other covers I uploaded at the same time went through with no problems, go figure

[TimR]

23 minutes ago, PaulWarning said:

you tube have dealt differently with copywrite issues on covers of songs I've put on there, they either don't pick them up, or the original songwriter isn't bothered, Daydream Believer was taken down (with a warning), when I uploaded a version of Mrs Robinson, it said they'd detected that the song was a cover and we wouldn't get any royalties for it, a couple of other covers I uploaded at the same time went through with no problems, go figure

 

It's because some publishers recognise that you're advertising their music for them. In a lot of cases people will see your performance and go looking for the original. Some don't understand how social media works and just block them. 

 

Rick Beato has covered this lots of times. Sometimes the publishers are so aggressive they will argue against the 'fair use' policy. 

 

I made a film and put an entire Kasabian track as backing music. YouTube just said they'd picked up, but as it was currently publicly available on YouTube that it would be OK and even added this to the description. 

 

 

 

 

Edited December 23, 2021 by TimR

[gapiro]

Just now, TimR said:

 

It's because some publishers recognise that you're advertising their music for them. In a lot of cases people will see your performance and go looking for the original. Some don't understand how social media works and just block them. 

 

Rick Beato has covered this lots of times. Sometimes the publishers are so aggressive they will argue against the 'fair use' policy. 

Fair use only covers a limited set of circumstances and is very grey at the best of times. 

Rerecording / covering an artist isn't fair use.

Parody - OF the original song - is borderline. (Weird Al Jankovic licenses all the songs he does)

Fair use typically only covers things like actively critique-ing the original material, incidental stuff  - eg filming something in a high street and a shop is playing it when you walk past, and a few other things. 

Just many publishers realise that it is 'social suicide' to go after people enjoying the material and directing popularity to the original artist

[TimR]

2 minutes ago, gapiro said:

Just many publishers realise that it is 'social suicide' to go after people enjoying the material and directing popularity to the original artist

 

 

I have added to my post. Seems some songs have been licensed to YouTube to play.