[Dogged]

I’ve got a fair amount of music in this genre as well and have yet to make any firm decisions about what I should do with it. I agree with the comments above about the need for doing “research”, but it would be nice to have a bit of clarification there–what’s the best way to research something like this? Just go down a giant list of libraries and scan through each one’s catalog to see if they carry hip-hop instrumentals? E-mail them to ask if they’re interested in the genre? Those are pretty much the only things I’d think to do, but I don’t have much experience with this side of things and am unsure if that would be sufficient… anyone? 🙂

[Dogged]

That’s great advice, “Advice”! Your username is well-chosen, indeed… 😉

I obviously agree with what everyone has said above about tail lengths. Like I said, I’d certainly keep them very short for the :15/:30/:60 edits, adding quicker fades to them if necessary, but would prefer to leave the extended tails in my full-length edits. Nothing crazy long even there, but more than just a couple of seconds. It sounds like that shouldn’t be too much of a problem, which is a relief.

The advice about avoiding modulations, ending on the root chord, etc., is most helpful. I hadn’t really considered that the classic step-up modulation might be a no-no, but of course it makes perfect sense to me now that it’s been brought up. That’s exactly the type of thing I was looking for when I asked about other possible “dealbreakers” in my post above. I would love to know any and all other such “no-nos” that anyone can think of. Should we have a separate thread dedicated to listing those, maybe? I’ll create one if anyone thinks it’s a good idea, otherwise I’d be fine with discussing them in this thread. Either way, this is definitely the kind of info I need, so thanks to all of you!

[Dogged]

No problem, we’ve all been there… 🙂

[Dogged]

I see the verdict seems to be unanimous! That’s a bit disappointing, but good to know. I’d still love to hear more opinions, but it sounds like I will have to abandon any hope of submitting a substantial number of tracks with fade endings.

This raises another related question, though: what to do with all of the music I’ve got that wasn’t originally written with libraries in mind? I’ve got a lot of material that’s more on the “artist” side of things, and I never quite know whether it’s worth trying to monetize those tracks in non-exclusive libraries. Those songs tend to be on the longer side, are often fairly complex, have various features such as fade endings that might be problematic, etc. My questions would then be:

(1) Aside from fade-outs, are there any other particular “dealbreakers” I’d need to watch out for when trying to monetize those tracks in non-exclusive libraries?

(2) Is it absolutely necessary to do extensive editing on those tracks to remove any and all such “dealbreakers” before trying to monetize them in non-exclusive libraries, or might it be a viable option to submit those tracks selectively to libraries that cater more to “artist”-style tracks? Are there even any libraries on the non-exclusive side of things that could be described that way? It would be great if there were, so that I could use them as my dump–er, submitting ground for the vast collection of tracks I’ve got that are in that vein. (They’re good tracks, I swear! Lots of potential, can see them being useful to music supes for various things, even if they’re not quite the typical library fare…)

For Library/Catalog work I either do really BIG endings, or end on a phrase that has some power to it. But, sometimes the effects drag WAY too long on tail. So, I fade the effects/tail to shorten the duration.

This raises another question: even when using a button ending, how long can the tail acceptably be? Sometimes I like to have some trailing FX and such that peter out gradually. At what duration does this become a sales liability? Anyone? 🙂

[Dogged]

I’m not sure I understand your question–non-exclusives are, well, non-exclusive. If the licensee goes under, why would you need to “get your songs back”? You never gave them up in the first place. If they get bought by another company, presumably those non-exclusive licenses would be transferred to the new owners along with all of the original company’s other assets. Again, not an issue for you, right? Is this an academic question, or do you have some specific real-world concerns in mind?

[Dogged]

MichaelL: Thank you for that typically cogent and thorough legal analysis. I can’t say I was surprised by any of it, of course. It’s fairly obvious that, strictly in a de jure legalistic sense, the burden with this kind of thing is going to fall entirely on the producer of the track. My interest here is in how likely it is to become an issue in practice in the particular kinds of situations under consideration here, and in how library owners and staff tend to approach this often-fuzzy area of concern, both in terms of how they’ll react pre-emptively upon recognizing famous one-shots, and how they’ll react upon receiving notice of a potentially uncleared use of such a sound.

Michael Nickolas: I’m not using any loops, but the situation you mention is also very relevant here, so thanks for bringing that up. In fact, I’d imagine that this same issue must be ten times worse for those who do use loops, given that an uncleared melody in a loop will be *vastly* more recognizable to the casual listener than an uncleared one-shot might be. Obviously, you’re right about trust. Unfortunately, very few vendors of samplepacks have the kind of extensive, profoundly impressive track record that would justify a truly firm level of trust. To make matters worse, I’m not sure how one can “verify” this sort of thing with the company providing the samples/loops. If the license agreement clearly states that the samples were cleared for commercial use–and that will of course be the case for any high-quality samplepack product that most of us would want to use–then isn’t it a given that the spokespeople for the company will mindlessly reaffirm that if questioned?

Indeed, the thing that’s throwing me for a loop here, and the reason I felt compelled to start this thread, is that I can’t think of any actual way to verify such things. It’s all well and good to say “don’t use famous one-shots or loops with recognizable melodies if you want to be on the safe side”, but the really scary part is that none of us are going to be able to do a perfect job, 100% of the time, of *knowing* which one-shots or melodies are in fact recognizable. Michael’s sax product is a perfect example here. Thankfully, he recognized that jazz melody–but what if he hadn’t? How can we feel safe using *any* of the samples or soundbanks we’ve purchased, particularly loops with prominent melodies, given that there are known to be all manner of uncleared bits and pieces floating around in many of those products, and no apparent way to actually double check this? That’s why I’ve been holding out hope that libraries might tend to be understanding when confronted with possible instances of this sort of thing, and not just drop the hammer immediately, and I’d be interested to see if folks here can confirm or deny that.

[Dogged]

Happy Ears (or anyone), can you please clarify the remark about the use of a guitar VI being unacceptable? I can see how the resulting sound might be too low-rent or cheesy to meet most libraries’ standards, but the reference to being “banned” suggests that the problem would be a legal/copyright/clearance thing. I don’t get why that should be the case–what’s the difference between a guitar VI and any other VI or sample library, in those terms? I’ve always assumed that as long as I carefully read through the license agreements for my VIs and sample libraries to ensure that they don’t have any relevant restrictions, I should be in the clear using them in my work. Is that a mistake?

[Dogged]

OK, then–the consensus appears to be that, while an album-like approach to panning may not quite be “best practice” for library work, it is a common one and generally acceptable. Good to know. Thanks, everyone!

[Dogged]

I’d certainly be extremely careful about any contract I might sign with an exclusive, but it’s heartening to know that there’s at least a hope of finding deals in that sector that don’t require giving away the rights. Still, the impression I’m getting so far is that our main focus would best be elsewhere.

(And thanks very much for offering up your assistance, Art! I’ve PM’ed you.)

[Dogged]

And, Mark’s last point about the potential legal pitfalls in signing with the exclusives was exactly why I had figured that there might not be much potential for us there, particularly when the songs in question are property of as impassioned and headstrong a band as I’ve been fortunate enough to get mixed up with 😉

[Dogged]

Thrilled to hear from you, Mark! I’ve long enjoyed your work, and your input means the world to me. It also seems like you very much get where I’m coming from with this. Your take makes perfect sense, and it helps a *lot* to have a specific recommendation on a library that will hopefully be a good fit. I’ll shortlist Audiosocket, for sure. Thank you!

Needless to say, any other suggestions any of you might have, whether for specific libraries or just on which types of industry professionals I should be seeking out and which types of deals I should be looking to do, will still be of immense help. 🙂

And, to “Advice”: I had gotten the impression that copyright buyouts are typical in deals with the exclusive libraries, often with reversion clauses in the event of non-placement. If you’re telling me we can get into the exclusive libraries without taking any chance on sacrificing copyright, even temporarily, that’s wonderful news, and it definitely opens up another avenue of opportunity.

[Dogged]

Desire Inspires,

Thanks for the suggestions! I’m always eager to have new primers, anecdotes and tidbits of advice. Having done an initial read-through of the two articles, they do contain some interesting food for thought here and there, but I’m running into the same problem I have with most of the other advice and guidance I’ve encountered, which is that in this case it’s a matter of a band having a small but significant catalog of music, already done and released, and most forms of exclusivity aren’t really going to be practical. That’s why my current hunch is that re-title libraries and perhaps certain kinds of publishing admin agreements (or some such thing) may be the only workable options. But I’m so out of my depth here that I’m a bit paralyzed and need to get some sense of whether I’m even remotely on the right track. I also note that the single most central pillar of the strategy advocated in the articles you’ve linked is pay-to-play (per submission opportunity, connection opportunity, etc.) In our case, some money actually IS there for that, and we’d do it for sure if not for the constant warnings against that model, and its general aura of semi-legitimacy. I am most certainly open to arguments for why I should take such services seriously, though.

[Dogged]

Art,

Thanks for your reply. I actually just got done doing a pretty careful read-through of the newbie info, along with a wide range of other wonderful posts here. In fact, had it not been for all that, I wouldn’t have known nearly enough to formulate my question here in the first place, so thanks for that as well! I must confess I don’t entirely see how my particular angle on this warrants a “check the newbie info”. I’ve tried not to be too clueless here, but it certainly is possible that I missed something embarrassingly obvious, and if that’s the case, a gentle pointer toward the post(s) that address the particular issues I’ve raised here should be more than helpful. The “will re-titling be a problem” question that I touched upon has certainly been discussed to death here and elsewhere, but perhaps not in quite this context, and in any case it was more of an aside than anything else. Anyway, I do apologize for any inadvertent numbskullery on my part.

[Dogged]

Interesting site! I can see how this model might be worthwhile. Has anyone else here used it, and if so what have your experiences been?

[Dogged]

Interested in this as I was considering maybe going with that TuneCore publishing thing. How has this situation developed over the last couple of weeks? Do things appear to be stable?

[Author]

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