General Music Chat

A lot of you guys have been around the block a time or two. Please post any tips or general knowledge you may have on the process of obtaining copyrights and doing demos / recording at professional studios.
Feel free to be general as I have no idea where to start.

A lot of you guys have been around the block a time or two. Please post any tips or general knowledge you may have on the process of obtaining copyrights and doing demos / recording at professional studios.
Feel free to be general as I have no idea where to start.

Copyright Info:

http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.html


Info on Choosing a Studio, Making a Demo, etc...

http://www.musesmuse.com/00000153.html


Preparation Checklist and Tips Before Going Into the Studio:

http://www.triplejunearthed.com/Resources/studio.pdf

Thank You Craig I'll begin my research.

sanshouheil,
Check back on previous postings.
Ther are a few multi-page postings on this topic already.
.
It tells you about one guy (me) who knew very little about copyrighting, how he learned about it, what forms to use, cautions, how to save money, and exposes a few wrong rumours about copyrighting.
Lots and lots of great info turned up on these previous postings . . . it's all current.
Read it.

It's all in plain english, and it will answer 98% of your questions . . .

Thanks or the heads up RM, I'll do that.

George
I have no idea how many songs I have written, but I do know that only two were ever copy-written. "Come On To Me" and "I Like Ronnie's Hair". Both made it to vinyl and received airplay (National in the case of Ronnie's Hair") I never lost any sleep worrying about any body stealing any of my songs. If an other party is interested in any of your material enough to invest in it, that's when I would concern myself with such technicality's. I expect that many people will disagree with my opinion.
Don't waste time and money on studio time until you've been playing' the game for awhile. . Technology today allows any decent player to produce an excellent "demo" recording at home. listen to the excellent quality Irish Anthony achieved in his latest home grown recording. This forum is rife with many other good examples.
Just my oppinion, take it for what it's worth.
John

In my opinion a good studio will save you time and possibly money. Most studios will try and make you buy a block of recording time up front, usually five or ten hours. Some will give you a special deal if you come in past 9:00 pm (midnight specials). A real professional studio technician will LISTEN to you as to what you want to sound like and then efficiently produce YOUR sound. DO NOT go into a studio until your music and arrangements are air tight, and you know exactly what you want to accomplish and have achieved the sound you want in rehearsal. The last studio experience I had (6 songs are on my profile page) was the VERY BEST I ever experienced. Every band member knew his part exactly beforehand. Everything was recorded live, actually one take on five of the seven songs we did. Vocals were overdubbed afterward, and some of the lead was dubbed in after as well. A final mix was done at the end. All told we spent just thirteen hours in the studio and came out with a satisfying result. When you get some music down really good and you want to get a superior recording sometimes a studio is well worth the money. Good luck.

Bob said " . . . DO NOT go into a studio until your music and arrangements are air tight . . ."
.
Good advice.
.
If you've never recorded before, you could be surprised to learn that you don't play nearly as good as you want to.
.
Guys, you need the get the first 5-10 seconds PERFECT, and then the music flows. Gotta have a good start.
.
And, also, it's a drag when you're playing the song better than you've ever heard it before, and, feeling good about it, you lose what you're dong.
Then . . .
Ooops. I didn't want to hit that note. It works ok, but . . . .
Damn, can we do another take? I know I can do that a lot better than that.
.
So, ok, you record it again, and you do the whole song great . . .
But - 3 - 1/2 minutes later, while feeling pleased with yourself, you screw up the last chord of the song, because, while you were starting to play it, you think of a better ending for the song . . .
.
My advice to anyone who's going to the studio, is to practice the beginning and end of every song, until you love the way you play them . . .
. . . cause, you'll save youself wasted time and money . . .

Another thing is to RELAX in the studio. I think when you try and be TOO perfect you screw up more often. And also a good studio technician can get rid of mistakes. There was some bad mistakes we made when we recorded. I asked the tech if he could get rid of the mistakes without messing the song up. He was able to do it with ease. It's kind of like thinking too much when you're climbing up or going down a staircase. You'll most likely trip. Just let the music flow as if you were at a gig or just like some of your best rehearsals. I'm totally relaxed in the studio. I don't expect to be perfect. I want more of a live sound anyway. The kind of music I usually play (blues) should have a live sound, even in the studio. Once you get a song tight and you get to the studio, HAVE FUN. Put some feeling into your playing. Studio work should be some of the best times you ever have in music. If the songs are tight, and the attitude is right, it will come through on the CD. This is where you hear the results of all your hard work. Recording is my favorite part of music. I think that's where I belong the most, can't wait to get back soon someday. Later...

One thing that will help prepare your engineer, is to bring examples of other recordings that you like, and want something similar. The music doesn't have to be exactly the same necessarily. Just the "sound" you are looking for. Some bands like a more dry sound, or more of a live sound to the album. Find other band's recordings that have the kind of feel and effects that you like, and take a copy to the engineer. This will help him immensely and save you time, because once he hears it, a good engineer can duplicate it pretty closely.

Thanks for the advice. Nothing talks and walks like experience.

sanshouheil,
So what's the story on copyrights?

It,s a split mix, some of us (members of the band) feel like we should copright our originals some of us dont. Ray our front man whom wrote a lot of the lyrics does not want to copyright. He said the the music should just be out there for anybody to do as they see fit with it. I would like to see us move foreward and get some profesional recordings done (when we are ready) and I have noticed that some if not all studios require a copyright or they wont touch it. At any rate weve only been together about 8 months and we (I) have a long way to go as musicians.

George,

Lately I havent copywrighted anything. But, you can put all your music on a cd. I think when I last did it it was on a cassette send it with the forms with the fee and call it the collected works of---------. This way you can get a copywrite for all your songs at once for one fee instead of individually. A few years ago you had to include a lyric sheet. It might take monthes to get it back just make sure you certify the postage to have a date that you sent it. Im sure Craig could guide you on this cause it seems he is real active these days.

If your singer wrote all the lyrics and doesnt want to copywrite the material I would think that ends the conversation.

You always hear, copywrite your music, copywrite your music, but has anyone who is a nobody in the music business been successul in winning a copywrite suit. When I say nobody I mean someone with no other material out there. The only suit that comes to mind to me is John Fogerty who was accused of plagerizing his own music a few years ago.

Craig if you see this has there been any suits you are aware of?

Im just curious, personally Im not to worried about it. If someone stole one of my songs and it became a million seller I might have concerns, but if someone asked I would probably give them the song.

On another note before you go into the studio make sure you know your music backwards and forewards. When you go in the clock is running and you dont want to waste time. Know what you are paying for.

Once I negotiated a per song price of $100, I did 10 songs over a 6 week period and it averaged out to $20 an hr which I thought was a good price.

I also got involved with a record project back in the day that got out of hand. We spent $12,000 on 12 songs. Being young the studio led us to believe that we had a contract with a local label and they would foot the bill, when all was said and done they handed us a bill for $30,000 which noone in the group had, we finally settled for the $12,000. We were told after the recording was done the label had changed its mind. We wound up with a record that sucked and thats putting it lightly. We were a heavy rock band and they tried to make us into a boy/pop band. Needless to say that band which was actually pretty good for its time didnt last long after that. Locally we got black listed for being "bad sports". Im sure you guys are much to smart to get into one of those situations.