SHOULD ARTIST GET PAID WHEN THEIR TUNES ARE RELEASED ON 12"

[dj snipaz]

esp when they have worldwide renowned artists signed to them

[test_recordings]

Fuck them back?

[grotbags]

Hi There

I have had a release (around 2 years ago) with a major label (still going now)
They have released my tune amongst others on the vinyl & as far as i can see all the major stores have now sold out of the product.
However, I am yet to receive any sort of payment from this.
Now, whenever i try to contact the guy I am ignored & the last I have heard is that he apparently has lost money on the release.
This has not stopped him releasing more though.

most lables have to sell roughly 400/500 copys to break even , if its sold out at major stores it does not mean that there is no copies in stock at the distributors warehouse , it means that there demand is not there for the release to justify a re-order ,if the lable has a p+d deal with a distributor its possible that the distributor wont repress the release due to how slow it sold or there is no demand for a repress as the distributor calls the shots with a p+d deal. if your saying its a major label which is still releaseing stuff its possible that your release didnt do well because your an unknown artist what the lable does before and after your release is not really your business and is not a sign that they are ripping you off.

This annoys me, especially seeing as we worked so hard on the tune. Thinking that someone else has made money out of our hard work makes me sick to the stomach

assuming that they made money out of your tune. be realistic with your self , your an unknown artist and 75% of vinyl sales are down to the artists profile , most vinyl buyers dont check the music they buy into the artists name

The next step is for me to expose & exploit the label so that no other poor f***er's experience this amount of unprofessional behaviour

expose them if you must but you need more to go on then just your gut feeling otherwise its you who ends up looking un-professional , and exposing major lables that dont pay will not stop people releaseing on there , best examples in this case is metalheads/renegade hardware.. many artists have came out over the years saying they never got paid but people still release on there.

honestly if you want to know the numbers hit up the distro

no distro will ever disclose a lables sales to anyone except the lable in question , its in all contracts.

Did you sign a contract? If you did, check the terms, some labels do upfront flat fee's, some labels do % based on sales.

If you didn't sign a contract, then i'm sorry, but it's your own fault you didn't receive any money and chasing them up will get you no where.

dubstep&contracts in the same sentence hahhahahah

honestly the easiest thing you can do that works legally for ownership is send a copy of the composition rendered as audio and the project file including all samples etc used to yourself thru the mail
that way you have a date and proof of ownership
the key it to leave it sealed
do this before you sign any contract

urban legend

[asa]

Hi There

I have had a release (around 2 years ago) with a major label (still going now)
They have released my tune amongst others on the vinyl & as far as i can see all the major stores have now sold out of the product.
However, I am yet to receive any sort of payment from this.
Now, whenever i try to contact the guy I am ignored & the last I have heard is that he apparently has lost money on the release.
This has not stopped him releasing more though.

most lables have to sell roughly 400/500 copys to break even , if its sold out at major stores it does not mean that there is no copies in stock at the distributors warehouse , it means that there demand is not there for the release to justify a re-order ,if the lable has a p+d deal with a distributor its possible that the distributor wont repress the release due to how slow it sold or there is no demand for a repress as the distributor calls the shots with a p+d deal. if your saying its a major label which is still releaseing stuff its possible that your release didnt do well because your an unknown artist what the lable does before and after your release is not really your business and is not a sign that they are ripping you off.

This annoys me, especially seeing as we worked so hard on the tune. Thinking that someone else has made money out of our hard work makes me sick to the stomach

assuming that they made money out of your tune. be realistic with your self , your an unknown artist and 75% of vinyl sales are down to the artists profile , most vinyl buyers dont check the music they buy into the artists name

The next step is for me to expose & exploit the label so that no other poor f***er's experience this amount of unprofessional behaviour

expose them if you must but you need more to go on then just your gut feeling otherwise its you who ends up looking un-professional , and exposing major lables that dont pay will not stop people releaseing on there , best examples in this case is metalheads/renegade hardware.. many artists have came out over the years saying they never got paid but people still release on there.

honestly if you want to know the numbers hit up the distro

no distro will ever disclose a lables sales to anyone except the lable in question , its in all contracts.

Did you sign a contract? If you did, check the terms, some labels do upfront flat fee's, some labels do % based on sales.

If you didn't sign a contract, then i'm sorry, but it's your own fault you didn't receive any money and chasing them up will get you no where.

dubstep&contracts in the same sentence hahhahahah

honestly the easiest thing you can do that works legally for ownership is send a copy of the composition rendered as audio and the project file including all samples etc used to yourself thru the mail
that way you have a date and proof of ownership
the key it to leave it sealed
do this before you sign any contract

urban legend

could'nt of ended the thread any better

[rob sparx]

It is actually really hard to make any money on vinyl - often noobs get pissed off thinking their owed money when actually their records have just made no profit (eg <300 sales), look at the sales and costs (and check with the distributor if possible) b4 slagging off any label on here - if the label is avoiding your phone calls and not giving you this info and treating u like a tnuc then thats a problem but its probably more likely that the record has just not made any profit

BTW having a contract is useless and posting something to yourself is a waste of time and actually has no effect legally

[dj snipaz]

This is the problem Rob
If i was informed of the fact that it made no money I would be satisfied.
But not been informed & been constantly ignored is what annoys most.
Its the principal of the matter..

[dj snipaz]

grotbags wrote:

dj snipaz wrote:Hi There

I have had a release (around 2 years ago) with a major label (still going now)
They have released my tune amongst others on the vinyl & as far as i can see all the major stores have now sold out of the product.
However, I am yet to receive any sort of payment from this.
Now, whenever i try to contact the guy I am ignored & the last I have heard is that he apparently has lost money on the release.
This has not stopped him releasing more though.



most lables have to sell roughly 400/500 copys to break even , if its sold out at major stores it does not mean that there is no copies in stock at the distributors warehouse , it means that there demand is not there for the release to justify a re-order ,if the lable has a p+d deal with a distributor its possible that the distributor wont repress the release due to how slow it sold or there is no demand for a repress as the distributor calls the shots with a p+d deal. if your saying its a major label which is still releaseing stuff its possible that your release didnt do well because your an unknown artist what the lable does before and after your release is not really your business and is not a sign that they are ripping you off.


dj snipaz wrote:
This annoys me, especially seeing as we worked so hard on the tune. Thinking that someone else has made money out of our hard work makes me sick to the stomach



assuming that they made money out of your tune. be realistic with your self , your an unknown artist and 75% of vinyl sales are down to the artists profile , most vinyl buyers dont check the music they buy into the artists name

dj snipaz wrote:
The next step is for me to expose & exploit the label so that no other poor f***er's experience this amount of unprofessional behaviour



expose them if you must but you need more to go on then just your gut feeling otherwise its you who ends up looking un-professional , and exposing major lables that dont pay will not stop people releaseing on there , best examples in this case is metalheads/renegade hardware.. many artists have came out over the years saying they never got paid but people still release on there.


deadly habit wrote:honestly if you want to know the numbers hit up the distro



no distro will ever disclose a lables sales to anyone except the lable in question , its in all contracts.


Jak The lad wrote:Did you sign a contract? If you did, check the terms, some labels do upfront flat fee's, some labels do % based on sales.

If you didn't sign a contract, then i'm sorry, but it's your own fault you didn't receive any money and chasing them up will get you no where.


dubstep&contracts in the same sentence hahhahahah


deadly habit wrote:honestly the easiest thing you can do that works legally for ownership is send a copy of the composition rendered as audio and the project file including all samples etc used to yourself thru the mail
that way you have a date and proof of ownership
the key it to leave it sealed
do this before you sign any contract

and the complete ignorance is justified because....?

if you read through the thread properly you would see that i mentioned that it was the plain faced ignorance which annoyed me mostly.
Anyone who says that this would not annoy them is lying

Is it too much to ask for a bit of professionalism within an industry?

[grotbags]

and the complete ignorance is justified because....?

if you read through the thread properly you would see that i mentioned that it was the plain faced ignorance which annoyed me mostly.
Anyone who says that this would not annoy them is lying

I cant comment about on their treatment of you as you're only giving one side of the argument... yours.

Is it too much to ask for a bit of professionalism within an industry?

TBH you're the one showing a serious lack of professionalism by coming on a public forum and whining about issues of which you don't have all the facts.

[j.nitrous]

and the complete ignorance is justified because....?

if you read through the thread properly you would see that i mentioned that it was the plain faced ignorance which annoyed me mostly.
Anyone who says that this would not annoy them is lying

I cant comment about on their treatment of you as you're only giving one side of the argument... yours.

Is it too much to ask for a bit of professionalism within an industry?

TBH you're the one showing a serious lack of professionalism by coming on a public forum and whining about issues of which you don't have all the facts.

How is he supposed to get all the facts when the label will not respond? Same with getting the other side of the story.
I would love to hear what the label has to say.

[grotbags]

and the complete ignorance is justified because....?

if you read through the thread properly you would see that i mentioned that it was the plain faced ignorance which annoyed me mostly.
Anyone who says that this would not annoy them is lying

I cant comment about on their treatment of you as you're only giving one side of the argument... yours.

Is it too much to ask for a bit of professionalism within an industry?

TBH you're the one showing a serious lack of professionalism by coming on a public forum and whining about issues of which you don't have all the facts.

How is he supposed to get all the facts when the label will not respond? Same with getting the other side of the story.

Exactly , so therefore he should be a pro and STFU till he does get in touch with them... what kid of professional seeks advice about contracts and his legal standing from a bunch of noobs on a forum? oe guy was even telling him to mail the tune to him self .. it still makes me laugh when I read it.

[legend4ry]

I think everyone with a release, how big or small, digital or vinyl has felt like they've not been paid but to be frank, most of us just didn't sell enough units. I know a lot of labels who don't actually have the heart to tell someone " oh, sorry you haven't sold enough"..

1) its makes you seem like your tunes ain't good enough. 2) it makes the label look like they didn't pull their weight, everyones unhappy.

You're best to just cut your losses, be happy you got signed & put tunes out there. Don't forget, somewhere in the world someone has the tune in their vinyl collection! Thats quite magical within its self and much more satisfying than a cheque in the post.

[lowpass]

I thought with this music the mere fact that you have the session file on your hard drive is proof that you wrote it? so unless you sent that to them then it's unlikely they will be trying to claim it as their own and "rip you off"

I agree with what others have said, they probably broke even / made a loss, keep trying to get at them though. Slinging mud at other people will only get your hands dirty so avoid bringing any names into this, you wanna keep professionalism as high as you can on your side, then other labels will be more likely to trust you instead of you being "that guy that rips on labels when his releases doesn't do so well"

[philippo]

Thats fucking awful!

You should of agreed to sign a contract whereby you decide how much you were to get from each record sold it is usually a 50/50 deal however this only applies when the label has broken even on the release.

I'm starting up a label and it is costing me £600 to get 300 vinyls pressed + mastered and Z audio have agreed for every record sold I get back £2.50 - even though I won't be making much of a return its just for the love of music, I think this record owner thought he would be making fuck loads of money when in fact its hard just to break even - honestly man, take this to court, try and get all his details and demand some money back!

[deadly_habit]

and the complete ignorance is justified because....?

if you read through the thread properly you would see that i mentioned that it was the plain faced ignorance which annoyed me mostly.
Anyone who says that this would not annoy them is lying

I cant comment about on their treatment of you as you're only giving one side of the argument... yours.

Is it too much to ask for a bit of professionalism within an industry?

TBH you're the one showing a serious lack of professionalism by coming on a public forum and whining about issues of which you don't have all the facts.

How is he supposed to get all the facts when the label will not respond? Same with getting the other side of the story.

Exactly , so therefore he should be a pro and STFU till he does get in touch with them... what kid of professional seeks advice about contracts and his legal standing from a bunch of noobs on a forum? oe guy was even telling him to mail the tune to him self .. it still makes me laugh when I read it.

so you must be the music lawyer who just registered? i was just passing along things i've been told over the years. either that or you're just trolling for the sake of trolling.
hell i paid the simple 30$ to register the copyright per tune on some of my stuff. it's not like names have been named here or anything, but as far as professionalism some labels def need to step up their games and send out quarterly sales invoices like they get from the distro, actually respond to correspondences (be it email, snail mail or phone calls), and actually honor the contract they signed.

[symmetricalsounds]

if your dealing with a label and they start talking about verbal contracts that internal alarm bell should be going off. sorry to hear you got fucked, but well at least you do have a tune out there on wax.

[rob sparx]

if your dealing with a label and they start talking about verbal contracts that internal alarm bell should be going off. sorry to hear you got fucked, but well at least you do have a tune out there on wax.

A lot of labels never bother with contracts because they just can't be arsed with it for the pitifully small returns off vinyl but doesn't mean they bump their artists

I think if your going to write pop music or something with commerical potential you should get that sort of thing locked down but for dubstep releases that only sell 300-500 units theres far less point

[symmetricalsounds]

a simple contract isn't that much hassle.

[rob sparx]

a simple contract isn't that much hassle.

I signed a "contract" before that when examined by someone with legal experience actually proved to be worthless. Labels tend to just copy generic contracts off the inet but that doesn't mean they are legally binding

[philippo]

Yeah true but surely its about the respect for one another - I don't think people go into dubstep thinking they are going to be making loads of money - The contract is just there to show the artist that there is a sense of professionalism with the label aswell as having a mutual agreement.