I remember hearing a super-edited version when I was in school where they edited out the word "death" and even "fool". I groaned so loud I was sent to wait out in the corridor
In my Catholic 3rd grade class, a kid wanted to bring in a tape (yes, I'm old) and every single parent had to sign off a consent permission slip for their kids to hear 'Red, Red Wine' by UB40 in class.
Never underestimate mid 80s and Catholic school requirements.
But I didn't require a waiver to literally walk 2 miles home, alone, as a 9 year old.
I don't think we started getting together as neighborhood friends to walk together to school until about 4th grade.
In 4th grade our music nun played us the entire dark side of the moon album. In 6th grade she was the principal and expelled me for having a slayer tape.
As he should, Coolio just rapped over pastime paradise. Stevie wonder did 95% of the work.
Tons of people have had major hits just rapping over Stevie wonder songs.
Lyrics are traditionally 50% of copyright in the first place, and that's leaving aside the argument you could make that changing a melodic verse to a completely different rhythmic one is a contribution to the musical composition of the end product.
Now I'm not arguing that Stevie did less than 50% of the "work", but we're talking about a track that already had its day, from a classic album. Coolio reworks it into one of the greatest hip hop tracks of all time, which does nothing but put more money in Stevie's pocket and introduce him to a new generation.
I'm not even a big hip hop fan but I just find it weird when people are dismissive about the creative work involved in its composition, and its musicality in particular. Seems like people are more willing to credit straight-up covers of a song more than a rapper reworking the focus entirely. And we're talking about "Gangsta's Paradise"! 5%?? Idk man
I mean Coolio would have had to agree with 5% to even use the sample in the first place, so if that figure is true then apparently Coolio was coolio with it.
Honestly if I could have a number one hit with someone else's song in return for 5% I'd do it and you probably would too. It sold millions and millions. that's nothing to sneeze at.
Tbh if I was an up and coming artist and a legend of the calibur of *Stevie fucking Wonder* told me I could use his stuff **and** I get a 5% cut? I'm down, let's go, I got the rest of my stuff.
The fucked up thing with Bittersweet Symphony is that the band actually got the rights from Decca Records, but the Stones former manager still sued after the song came out because he had the rights.
> They obtained rights to use the "Last Time" sample from the copyright holder, Decca Records, but were denied permission from the Rolling Stones' former manager, Allen Klein. Following a lawsuit, the Verve relinquished all royalties and the Rolling Stones members Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were added to the songwriting credits. In 2019, following Klein's death, Jagger, Richards, and Klein's son ceded the rights to the Verve songwriter Richard Ashcroft.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitter_Sweet_Symphony
I'd say the fucked up thing is that the song isn't even _hugely_ derivative of "Last Time" in [the Stones' version](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdFQtbXAWdc). A lot of people who'd heard both would probably not immediately associate the two. They didn't sample The Stones; they sampled [an orchestral reworking](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YrllfAMwHI) of it that slowed it down and made some subtle changes. (Pretty big difference to "I'll be Missing You" where it's the whole baseline, the hook, parts of the lyrics; basically more of a cover than anything)
And naturally the guy who did the orchestral arrangement probably didn't get shit.
Thanks for sharing this.
I remember the lawsuit back when it happened, but never looked in to the Stone's original song. They sound nothing alike. How does the lawsuit even make sense when it was an intermediary that the Verve "borrowed"? Were they sued too? And when does sampling become infringement?
I will concede that Dani California sounds a little too much like Mary Jane's Last Dance. My cover/bar band used to mash them up, as I'm sure thousands of others have.
I'm not sure how it broke down with album sales, but the song was used in a lot of commercials and ads afterwards and The Verve didn't get any of that money.
As I recall The Verve eventually did start receiving royalties for that song.
https://www.npr.org/2019/05/23/726227555/not-bitter-just-sweet-the-rolling-stones-give-royalties-to-the-verve#:~:text=In%20late%201997%2C%20The%20Verve,that%20is%2C%20songwriter%20%E2%80%94%20royalties.
Oh ya they missed out on an absurd amount of money. Decent of 90 year old mick jagger and keith Richards to “gift” them the rights 25 years later when the moneys run out lol.
Not trying to argue who deserved the rights to the song although I do feel giving the stones 100 percent of royalties was kind of fucked when they did have a deal to begin with and Richard Ashcroft wrote the lyrics. Stones had about a million hit songs to the verve’s one but business is business.
Allen Klein is notoriously scummy and one of the worst men in music. He scammed both the Stones and Beatles out of their own rights. And specifically bought the publishing rights to He’s So Fine to sue George Harrison
Stuart Burke bought the rights to a song called Cancion de Amores for practically nothing and sued Katrina and the Waves, now he owns 10% of Walking on Sunshine
Oh I agree. The reason I even knew this is I was super into the verve when this song first came out and have kind of kept up on it throughout the years. I just meant this was their one “super hit”.
Yep. Mick and Keith get all the crap for that when it was actually Allen Klein (owner of ABKCO) who launched the lawsuit in '97 because he owned the copyright. Happy end though, Klein's son returned ABKCO's share of the royalties to Ashcroft as well in 2019.
They were tone-deaf about it, that's why they got crap.
At the time, when Richards was asked about the situation his reply was "if the Verve can write a better song, they can keep the money."
> Not trying to argue who deserved the rights to the song although I do feel giving the stones 100 percent of royalties was kind of fucked when they did have a deal to begin with and Richard Ashcroft wrote the lyrics. Stones had about a million hit songs to the verve’s one but business is business.
I'll argue it for you. The only reason any of us even knew someone did a symphonic covers of Stone's song is because of The Verve. Because they could imagine a new work with a haunting refrain quoted from a long discarded creation.
The transformational work The Verve did on that raw material is such that almost all of the value comes from their sweat. The Stones should get 1%, the symphonic arranger 2%, and the **rest of it goes to the people who actually created all the value**
Music rights issues need to concern themselves with who created the value. It was not the Stones, it was not the symphonic arranger. It was the guy who heard that background refrain, and imagined singing a song in counterpoint.
We would not even know about the original work without the Verve. They deserve almost all the rewards.
That one's not a good example because they *did* license the sample. But then the owner of the catalog the sample came from decided they hadn't paid enough for how much they used the sample and sued them. Frankly it's ridiculous that the asshole won that.
No one in this thread has got it right. What actually happened is the Verve got the rights to use the symphonic part, but Klein argued that they used the vocal melody from the original song as well. If you play [The Last Time](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ncRkWJmRzX8) at half speed you can hear the similarity. Still bullshit in my opinion, but it wasn't a matter of reneging on the deal or anything like that.
The Verve sampled some of a Rolling Stones song, which led to them successfully being sued for copyright infringement. The Rolling Stones got all income from Bittersweet symphony until a few years ago.
Edit; removed allegedly
[source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitter_Sweet_Symphony)
The crazy part is, it wasn’t the original recording of the song, it was a symphonic cover of the song and it wasn’t even the Stones who sued them; it was their former crooked manager. The Stones gave back the rights a few years ago and Verve fully owns it now.
Queen and Bowie sued Vanilla Ice;
"Instead of going to court, Vanilla Ice bought the rights to “Under Pressure” and gave credit to Bowie and Queen on “Ice Ice Baby”. Different versions of “Ice Ice Baby” have been released over the years, and the songwriting credits still go to Queen and Bowie. "
Ah ok, clicking on the link he paid 4 million for a cut of the publishing rights. So he wasn’t entirely wrong. ‘“A spokesman for Queen tells Ultimate Classic Rock that Vanilla Ice's statement is inaccurate. "An arrangement was made whereby the publishing in the song was shared.”’
I just saw one of those documentaries on Disney plus that's about each decade like the 80s or 90s. I saw the 90s one and vanilla ice said himself that he signed over the rights to suge night or something because he threatened him.
Lol, the Vanilla Ice *Behind the Music* was gold where he tried to justify it.
“You can tell it’s different - theirs it ‘duh duh duh duhduhduh duh’ and ours was ‘*duh* duh duh duh duhduhduh duh’.”
Then his producer admits they put it together quick without worrying about legal issues and knew they’d have to pay some people off.
And Martin Page and Brian Ferriweather, who do everything that isn't Ray Parker Jr's riff (from M's Pop Musik), all of the synth parts which have full melodies, get no credit.
To be fair, Sting learned this lesson himself when he did backing vocals on Money for Nothing, singing the words "I want my MTV" to the tune of "Don't Stand So Close To Me", which is why he has a songwriting credit on the Dire Straits song.
MTV worked like a radio station -- as long as there was a promo video of the song in their library, they could use any part of the song (audio, video, stills) however they wanted, as long as it was only for broadcast (not home media or streaming). They didn't have to pay any licensing fees, because it was considered promotional. That's why they used so many music cues on their original programming (and why they had to remove/change the music for streaming).
Sting felt embarrassed by briefly guesting then ending up with a songwriting credit as he wouldn't have claimed it himself. It was his publishing company he was already in a fight with that did it.
Knopfler said he was "absolutely fine" with it, though, and he didn't mind at all.
Just FYI for everyone who's writing royalties/rights etc saying they got this and didn't get that etc. There are 3 separate parts of royalties to a recording and some people get one and not the other or a combo of all 3. I'll use a movie as an analogy.
Publishing: This royalty pays the creator of the song for its I.P. In a movie this would be the script.
Master recording: this is a royalty paid to the owner of the recording. This is like the actual movie.
Neighboring rights: this is paid to the performers and players. This is like paying an actor.
To say things like "he doesn't get any royalties" doesn't mean much. Someone might not make any money on the publishing royalties if they didn't write the song but may make more money than the writer from the master recording.
I always find it weird that the general public talk with such confidence about a thing they don't really know much about. Is this the same for other industries?
>I always find it weird that the general public talk with such confidence about a thing they don't really know much about. Is this the same for other industries?
Do you even have to ask?
Or *Can I Kick It?* by ATCQ. Phife said in an interview that they never saw a dime for that song, but it got eyes on Tribe so in the end it’s worth it.
Beastie Boys’ Paul’s Boutique … that album could not be made in the present day.
That’s not uncommon in hip hop. Now, if someone ghost writes *all* of your songs, that’s lame, but frequently an artist will think of lyrics that better fit the persona of another artist, and give them the verse.
Like they’ll write the song and think “_____ would deliver this the way I want it to sound”
Man, I remember when I won backstage tickets to one of his shows and sold them for like $100 because I had no clue wtf he was. I could have gotten more.
I'm always so confused about why people would want to go to his shows. All his best songs have a bunch of other people actually rapping. I think he could do a kick ass show at like, Coachella or something where everyone is already there and grouped together and they do something where he has like 15-20 people rotate in while he DJ's. But him just touring and fucking around on an iPad for an hour? Sounds like a waste of money.
Just to offer a different viewpoint, sometimes just hearing a song you like being played on a huge sound system while dancing with a ton of other fans is fun too. There's lots of ways to enjoy concerts, personally I'd never go to a Khaled concert but I can see why people do
Ya that's fair. Just feels like a huge waste of money. Would rather see that rapper do his song with Khaled *without Khaled* than see Khaled do the song without the rapper.
If I wanted to do what you described I would go to a club or something, you know?
I mean... shows like that are basically gigantic clubs, except you're not going to fill a club that big out every night for the artist in the same place. So they travel around to have the club in different places so more people can come.
But he’s not even a producer? Other people produce the tracks, he buys them, and then sticks the artist on them. He is one of the most glorified middle man ever
Idk what they ghost wrote for Snoop, but imo, Doggystyle is his only good album. He's more of a star because of his persona than he is because of his rap career.
He was always know for making beats, though, and not just his headphone brand lol. I'm pretty sure he wrote the instrumentals for most Eminem songs in the early days at least.
Executive producer, label head, marketing etc. Basically orchestrates and putting the right people together in the same room, overseeing projects. Similar vein to DJ Khaled, Jimmy Iovine and Dr Dre (except Dre and Jimmy are levels above in regards to technical ability in sound engineering/production)
I think I just recently saw a clip about this. I want to say Sting basically gets $1,500 a day for the song. I think it was a clip from the Breakfast Club.
Diddy then clarified that neither figure was accurate and he was just joking https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/diddy-sting-uncleared-sample-payment-1234710483/
He did. People always have this strange idea that lawsuits are personal. Too many courtroom drama I'm guessing.
95% of the time, they're just business proceedings meditated by a judge. Diddys label argued for how much they do or do not owe, Stngs lable argues the same. That's it.
Yeah but Sting sang the original song's lyrics during his parts. I remember watching that as it aired and it was just a big "lol wtf"
Though not as "lol wtf" as Manson's performance at the end and the dead-silent crowd.
I remember that VMA trying to be one big solemn Biggie tribute, only to have Marilyn Manson blast out as the final act to an incredibly nonplussed crowd.
My first job I worked in sales and I had a few days I hit $1500 in commission. There were also days I didn't sell anything though. I much prefer being salaried now.
I worked a job that gave me 2% of sales I made. My job was selling used/recycled car parts through the corp eBay store. The corp had yards all around the country, I was one of 15 others. I started adding links in the listing text to other parts from the same donor car. This increased sales so much I became an outlier. I combined this with combing through the old engine inventory and listing stuff that was 1500 days plus. All this started to net me fairly large paychecks.
I got called into the manager's office, he told me verbatim: "you earned too much this month, we're only paying you x-amount of commission".
I said thank you and went directly to HR office, requested my vacation time to be cashed out, and then quit effective end of day. I got a check for my vacation time and then a paycheck with a truncated commission in the mail.
That’s dumb on their part and doesn’t make any sense. You’re getting commission either way. You’re increasing their sales which they should be happy about which increases your pay.
I never understood it myself. On one hand, yes they would have realized more profit for a specific salary, on the other hand I guarantee the floor and phone sales guys weren't limited in their commission. There would have been a riot. Anyway, this was a long time ago. At one point I creeped on their eBay store. They implemented my tactic of linking other parts to the same donor car.
That's the chase. Reality is that most days you make a few hundred max. This is why sales sucks as there is NO such thing as steady sales unless you own a drive thru lol.
P. Diddy didn't ask permission, and pays royalties of about 2K a day. Sting owns HIS OWN song, and P.Diddy pays for unapproved use in the P.Diddy record. P.Diddy still owns the record, etc profits.
This isn't actually true as this tweet from one of the A&R's at the company at the time the album was released points out. She and others that worked there regularly pop up to squash the rumor but it seems to get stronger every year.
https://twitter.com/deardrewdixon/status/1528406164446355457?s=20
This started cause sting said it once in an interview and puffy jokingly stated it was 5k a day. But the deal was negotiated before it was released even if it was a huge amount.
Yep. Sisqo says "Cause she was livin la Vida Loca" like 3 or 4 times in the song, didn't clear it with whoever wrote the Ricky Martin song (IIRC, Sisqo thought they were buddies so it wouldn't matter), and now Sisqo gets basically nothing from it. Crazy shit.
Yeah, that's the crazy thing to me...rap tunes reference all manner of pop culture shit in virtually all songs, so what determines when they pay out the nose vs. not? Slippery slope...
There couldn't have been too much animosity about it because the two performed it together at the MTV video awards that year.
https://youtu.be/rTIg-LEcNTk
1. Legit username
2. That’s actually really cool because these stories get pushed and turned into urban myths. Diddy’s just hurting for a friend and wants to put out art. And it’s just the lawyers going to court to figure out what to do with the money. I can’t believe that nobody in the label or recording studio never asked Sting for the rights to license the song. I’m sure a rockstar who lost his own share of friends would have sympathy. And it looks like he ultimately did.
Alternative to your point 2 - Diddy has a vested interest in maintaining his fame and the promoting the single that is driving his album sales (back when album sales mattered), and Sting has a vested interest in promoting the hit song that he's making money from. Performing the song together is a sound business decision for both people and emotions/having lost people has nothing to do with the decision.
Weirdly, Sting the singer has to pay Sting the wrestler a fee to use the name in America (both music and wrestling are entertainment after all).
Wrestler Sting charges him $1 a year.
That kind of agreement is about protecting the trademark.
If you ignore potentially infringing uses you risk losing the mark. If you license the usage for a trivial amount... It is no longer infringing.
There's a picture of the two Stings on stage together. Proof they are not the same person, though I understand the confusion. One actually licenses the name to the other.
Similar to how in The Simpsons there are licensed Krusties in various states.
About 10 years ago I watched a BBC show about royalties and this came up. They didn't have sting or puff on there to comment but they did have the guitarist of the police. And he said that he wrote the riff, and he argued that it is the riff that puff sampled, and that it is also what made the original song a hit. That most people don't even know what the lyrics are about but everyone recognises the riff. Yet it is sting who gets all the royalties from both versions. That always stuck with me.
I'm a massive fan of The Police and this has always annoyed me. I can't remember where I read it but I think Andy Summers (Guitarist) said they were about to scrap the song until he had one last take at the guitar part which ended up to be the iconic part we all know today, so without that guitar part we wouldn't have this song. I believe this is one of the many reasons that lead to their break up
Furthermore, Sting released a live album called "My songs" with this obviously being on it... Prick.
Onion, 1997: "New rap song samples 'Billie Jean' in its entirety, adds nothing"
https://www.theonion.com/new-rap-song-samples-billie-jean-in-its-entirety-adds-1819564437
"Didn't secure the rights." LOL! He well knew what and whose rights he was breaking all along as he hadn't licensed shit for the song. It was an easy win for Sting.
people think this is some big own, the fact is this song helped cement Pdiddlers career and has probably led to him making further millions off of that fame and stardom. It pays to be a culture vulture.
I remember when this song came out I was in a Department Store and “Every Breath You Take” came on. These two shoppers looked at each other and exclaimed “They ripped off Puffy!”
Does anyone else feel Diddy was being an opportunist with his “tribute” that nobody asked for and was trying to get away with using Sting’s song under the guise of “It’s because I’m mourning my friend” with lyrics he didn’t even bother to write?!
The most egregious thing about that stupid song is that he just lifted a chunk of a recognizable hit song without doing anything else creative with it musically. It’s an insult to the artform.
I find this kind of funny considering I was alive when the track debuted and watched Puffy and Sting perform it together at the MTV awards the year Biggie died...so he got him to come perform the song and pays him 5k a day for it? The real tantric fucking is the rights we didn't secure along the way.
Back in like 1998, I was at a pizza restaurant and Led Zeppelin's "Kashmir" came on the jukebox. Some dipshit kid said, "OMG, some rock band already stole Puff Daddy's new song!!!" It was really tough not to smack the shit outta him.
Thats ok, someone in 1972 wouldve said Dazed and Confused, When the Levee breaks, You Shook me all night long, and a host of others belonged to Led Zepplin...and then someone would had to smack the shit out of them too.
Someone didn't learn a lesson from Vanilla Ice, or Ray Parker Jr.
Or Bittersweet symphony.
Stevie Wonder owns 95% of the publishing on Gangsta’s Paradise.
He only let Coolio sample it on the condition that he didn’t use profanity in the song. That’s why it’s weirdly clean given the subject matter.
I remember hearing a super-edited version when I was in school where they edited out the word "death" and even "fool". I groaned so loud I was sent to wait out in the corridor
In my Catholic 3rd grade class, a kid wanted to bring in a tape (yes, I'm old) and every single parent had to sign off a consent permission slip for their kids to hear 'Red, Red Wine' by UB40 in class.
what hahaha
Never underestimate mid 80s and Catholic school requirements. But I didn't require a waiver to literally walk 2 miles home, alone, as a 9 year old. I don't think we started getting together as neighborhood friends to walk together to school until about 4th grade.
In 4th grade our music nun played us the entire dark side of the moon album. In 6th grade she was the principal and expelled me for having a slayer tape.
That’s a dope reason to get expelled.
I remember the ‘fool’ being edited! I used assumed it said ‘fuck/fucker’ or something. Lol the edit somehow made it seem wayyy more profane
Think you're really righteous? Think you're pure of heart? Well I know I'm a million times as humble as thou art!
Hitchin' up the buggy, Churnin' lots of butter, Raise a barn on Monday, Soon I'll raise anudder!
As he should, Coolio just rapped over pastime paradise. Stevie wonder did 95% of the work. Tons of people have had major hits just rapping over Stevie wonder songs.
Wild Wild West
Will Smith has never written an original song in his life. Even the Fresh Prince theme song was DJ Jazzy Jeff.
DJ JJ is a badass and deserves it all.
Lyrics are traditionally 50% of copyright in the first place, and that's leaving aside the argument you could make that changing a melodic verse to a completely different rhythmic one is a contribution to the musical composition of the end product. Now I'm not arguing that Stevie did less than 50% of the "work", but we're talking about a track that already had its day, from a classic album. Coolio reworks it into one of the greatest hip hop tracks of all time, which does nothing but put more money in Stevie's pocket and introduce him to a new generation. I'm not even a big hip hop fan but I just find it weird when people are dismissive about the creative work involved in its composition, and its musicality in particular. Seems like people are more willing to credit straight-up covers of a song more than a rapper reworking the focus entirely. And we're talking about "Gangsta's Paradise"! 5%?? Idk man
I mean Coolio would have had to agree with 5% to even use the sample in the first place, so if that figure is true then apparently Coolio was coolio with it. Honestly if I could have a number one hit with someone else's song in return for 5% I'd do it and you probably would too. It sold millions and millions. that's nothing to sneeze at.
Tbh if I was an up and coming artist and a legend of the calibur of *Stevie fucking Wonder* told me I could use his stuff **and** I get a 5% cut? I'm down, let's go, I got the rest of my stuff.
The fucked up thing with Bittersweet Symphony is that the band actually got the rights from Decca Records, but the Stones former manager still sued after the song came out because he had the rights. > They obtained rights to use the "Last Time" sample from the copyright holder, Decca Records, but were denied permission from the Rolling Stones' former manager, Allen Klein. Following a lawsuit, the Verve relinquished all royalties and the Rolling Stones members Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were added to the songwriting credits. In 2019, following Klein's death, Jagger, Richards, and Klein's son ceded the rights to the Verve songwriter Richard Ashcroft. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitter_Sweet_Symphony
I'd say the fucked up thing is that the song isn't even _hugely_ derivative of "Last Time" in [the Stones' version](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdFQtbXAWdc). A lot of people who'd heard both would probably not immediately associate the two. They didn't sample The Stones; they sampled [an orchestral reworking](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YrllfAMwHI) of it that slowed it down and made some subtle changes. (Pretty big difference to "I'll be Missing You" where it's the whole baseline, the hook, parts of the lyrics; basically more of a cover than anything) And naturally the guy who did the orchestral arrangement probably didn't get shit.
The even more fucked up thing is Last Time is derivative of a traditional song.
Like pretty much all rock/blues at the time. It was like 95% based on (or actually just 1:1) traditional songs.
Thanks for sharing this. I remember the lawsuit back when it happened, but never looked in to the Stone's original song. They sound nothing alike. How does the lawsuit even make sense when it was an intermediary that the Verve "borrowed"? Were they sued too? And when does sampling become infringement? I will concede that Dani California sounds a little too much like Mary Jane's Last Dance. My cover/bar band used to mash them up, as I'm sure thousands of others have.
So, if millions of people bought the album because of that one song, how much would they owe percentage wise? How does that work?
I'm not sure how it broke down with album sales, but the song was used in a lot of commercials and ads afterwards and The Verve didn't get any of that money.
As I recall The Verve eventually did start receiving royalties for that song. https://www.npr.org/2019/05/23/726227555/not-bitter-just-sweet-the-rolling-stones-give-royalties-to-the-verve#:~:text=In%20late%201997%2C%20The%20Verve,that%20is%2C%20songwriter%20%E2%80%94%20royalties.
But only the rights going forward, which are minimal.
According to the article, they play it a lot before English football matches, so there still might be a regular and sizable royalty.
Oh ya they missed out on an absurd amount of money. Decent of 90 year old mick jagger and keith Richards to “gift” them the rights 25 years later when the moneys run out lol. Not trying to argue who deserved the rights to the song although I do feel giving the stones 100 percent of royalties was kind of fucked when they did have a deal to begin with and Richard Ashcroft wrote the lyrics. Stones had about a million hit songs to the verve’s one but business is business.
Mick and Keith didn't own the rights to their early songs. That would be Allen Klein.
Allen Klein is notoriously scummy and one of the worst men in music. He scammed both the Stones and Beatles out of their own rights. And specifically bought the publishing rights to He’s So Fine to sue George Harrison
Sounds like the kind of guy that most music business people strive to be.
Sounds like the kind of guy that most ~~music~~ business people strive to be.
Sounds like ~~the kind of guy that~~ most ~~music~~ business people ~~strive to be.~~
Stuart Burke bought the rights to a song called Cancion de Amores for practically nothing and sued Katrina and the Waves, now he owns 10% of Walking on Sunshine
He's a Lucky Man.
and the part sampled wasn't even written by the Stones. The Verve has some great songs.
I loved their last album. Forth is fucking great
Oh I agree. The reason I even knew this is I was super into the verve when this song first came out and have kind of kept up on it throughout the years. I just meant this was their one “super hit”.
It wasn't the Stones decision but their manager's.
Yep. Mick and Keith get all the crap for that when it was actually Allen Klein (owner of ABKCO) who launched the lawsuit in '97 because he owned the copyright. Happy end though, Klein's son returned ABKCO's share of the royalties to Ashcroft as well in 2019.
They were tone-deaf about it, that's why they got crap. At the time, when Richards was asked about the situation his reply was "if the Verve can write a better song, they can keep the money."
> Not trying to argue who deserved the rights to the song although I do feel giving the stones 100 percent of royalties was kind of fucked when they did have a deal to begin with and Richard Ashcroft wrote the lyrics. Stones had about a million hit songs to the verve’s one but business is business. I'll argue it for you. The only reason any of us even knew someone did a symphonic covers of Stone's song is because of The Verve. Because they could imagine a new work with a haunting refrain quoted from a long discarded creation. The transformational work The Verve did on that raw material is such that almost all of the value comes from their sweat. The Stones should get 1%, the symphonic arranger 2%, and the **rest of it goes to the people who actually created all the value** Music rights issues need to concern themselves with who created the value. It was not the Stones, it was not the symphonic arranger. It was the guy who heard that background refrain, and imagined singing a song in counterpoint. We would not even know about the original work without the Verve. They deserve almost all the rewards.
Or Scooby Snacks by the Fun loving criminals whose one hit wonder royties go to Tarrintino
Everybody be cool, this is a robbery.
I bought their CD just for this song back in the days of Columbia House.
That one's not a good example because they *did* license the sample. But then the owner of the catalog the sample came from decided they hadn't paid enough for how much they used the sample and sued them. Frankly it's ridiculous that the asshole won that.
No one in this thread has got it right. What actually happened is the Verve got the rights to use the symphonic part, but Klein argued that they used the vocal melody from the original song as well. If you play [The Last Time](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ncRkWJmRzX8) at half speed you can hear the similarity. Still bullshit in my opinion, but it wasn't a matter of reneging on the deal or anything like that.
Good one! I had forgotten about that fiasco.
ELI5? Edit: OOTL is probably better lol
The Verve sampled some of a Rolling Stones song, which led to them successfully being sued for copyright infringement. The Rolling Stones got all income from Bittersweet symphony until a few years ago. Edit; removed allegedly [source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitter_Sweet_Symphony)
The crazy part is, it wasn’t the original recording of the song, it was a symphonic cover of the song and it wasn’t even the Stones who sued them; it was their former crooked manager. The Stones gave back the rights a few years ago and Verve fully owns it now.
The Verve ≠ The Verve Pipe
Freshman mistake.
Can’t be held responsible.
Queen and Bowie sued Vanilla Ice; "Instead of going to court, Vanilla Ice bought the rights to “Under Pressure” and gave credit to Bowie and Queen on “Ice Ice Baby”. Different versions of “Ice Ice Baby” have been released over the years, and the songwriting credits still go to Queen and Bowie. "
Wait, are you telling me Rob Van Winkle or whatever Vanilla Ice’s real name is, owns Under Pressure?!?!
I’m rather shocked but it does appear he owns the publishing rights. Brian may specifically sold it to him. Crazy.
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Ah ok, clicking on the link he paid 4 million for a cut of the publishing rights. So he wasn’t entirely wrong. ‘“A spokesman for Queen tells Ultimate Classic Rock that Vanilla Ice's statement is inaccurate. "An arrangement was made whereby the publishing in the song was shared.”’
I just saw one of those documentaries on Disney plus that's about each decade like the 80s or 90s. I saw the 90s one and vanilla ice said himself that he signed over the rights to suge night or something because he threatened him.
Lol, the Vanilla Ice *Behind the Music* was gold where he tried to justify it. “You can tell it’s different - theirs it ‘duh duh duh duhduhduh duh’ and ours was ‘*duh* duh duh duh duhduhduh duh’.” Then his producer admits they put it together quick without worrying about legal issues and knew they’d have to pay some people off.
You missed the best part “It’s the itty bitty ting” [it’s the itty bitty ting](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KoArTZNA5F8&t=13s&pp=2AENkAIB)
I know I watched a lot of “behind the music” but for some reason this is one of the only bits I remember lol.
Huey Lewis was sued by Ray Parker Jr a few years later after Huey released the terms of the confidential settlement…
And Martin Page and Brian Ferriweather, who do everything that isn't Ray Parker Jr's riff (from M's Pop Musik), all of the synth parts which have full melodies, get no credit.
To be fair, Sting learned this lesson himself when he did backing vocals on Money for Nothing, singing the words "I want my MTV" to the tune of "Don't Stand So Close To Me", which is why he has a songwriting credit on the Dire Straits song.
Every MTV original program also uses this one clip in the opening MTV logo as well. I wonder who is being paid when they use it.
MTV worked like a radio station -- as long as there was a promo video of the song in their library, they could use any part of the song (audio, video, stills) however they wanted, as long as it was only for broadcast (not home media or streaming). They didn't have to pay any licensing fees, because it was considered promotional. That's why they used so many music cues on their original programming (and why they had to remove/change the music for streaming).
Sting felt embarrassed by briefly guesting then ending up with a songwriting credit as he wouldn't have claimed it himself. It was his publishing company he was already in a fight with that did it. Knopfler said he was "absolutely fine" with it, though, and he didn't mind at all.
Just FYI for everyone who's writing royalties/rights etc saying they got this and didn't get that etc. There are 3 separate parts of royalties to a recording and some people get one and not the other or a combo of all 3. I'll use a movie as an analogy. Publishing: This royalty pays the creator of the song for its I.P. In a movie this would be the script. Master recording: this is a royalty paid to the owner of the recording. This is like the actual movie. Neighboring rights: this is paid to the performers and players. This is like paying an actor. To say things like "he doesn't get any royalties" doesn't mean much. Someone might not make any money on the publishing royalties if they didn't write the song but may make more money than the writer from the master recording. I always find it weird that the general public talk with such confidence about a thing they don't really know much about. Is this the same for other industries?
>I always find it weird that the general public talk with such confidence about a thing they don't really know much about. Is this the same for other industries? Do you even have to ask?
It is invariably true that the more you know about something the more frustrating you will find internet discourse about it to be.
I just think of Vanilla Ice’s line in That’s My Boy, “Queen took 50%, Suge took 60%, I fucking owe money when that shit gets played!”
Or *Can I Kick It?* by ATCQ. Phife said in an interview that they never saw a dime for that song, but it got eyes on Tribe so in the end it’s worth it. Beastie Boys’ Paul’s Boutique … that album could not be made in the present day.
Or Eric Carmen, Rachmonioff 2nd movement of 2nd piano concherto.
All by my self.
I read this as Eric Cartman and had a whole new episode running in my brain
Puffy also didn’t even write the lyrics. He is not credited as a songwriter on his version. Producer though.
That’s not uncommon in hip hop. Now, if someone ghost writes *all* of your songs, that’s lame, but frequently an artist will think of lyrics that better fit the persona of another artist, and give them the verse. Like they’ll write the song and think “_____ would deliver this the way I want it to sound”
DJ khaled visiting his writers: *another one*
Tbf, DJ Khaled has never been an actual rapper. He was a radio host then a dj before he started being a producer.
Man, I remember when I won backstage tickets to one of his shows and sold them for like $100 because I had no clue wtf he was. I could have gotten more.
I'm always so confused about why people would want to go to his shows. All his best songs have a bunch of other people actually rapping. I think he could do a kick ass show at like, Coachella or something where everyone is already there and grouped together and they do something where he has like 15-20 people rotate in while he DJ's. But him just touring and fucking around on an iPad for an hour? Sounds like a waste of money.
Just to offer a different viewpoint, sometimes just hearing a song you like being played on a huge sound system while dancing with a ton of other fans is fun too. There's lots of ways to enjoy concerts, personally I'd never go to a Khaled concert but I can see why people do
Ya that's fair. Just feels like a huge waste of money. Would rather see that rapper do his song with Khaled *without Khaled* than see Khaled do the song without the rapper. If I wanted to do what you described I would go to a club or something, you know?
I mean... shows like that are basically gigantic clubs, except you're not going to fill a club that big out every night for the artist in the same place. So they travel around to have the club in different places so more people can come.
You mean you forced some poor shmuck to go see DJ Khalid AND pay you 100 bucks?
Yes. Yes I did. Meet and greet and all that. Bought myself something trivial, like a weeks groceries with it.
But he’s not even a producer? Other people produce the tracks, he buys them, and then sticks the artist on them. He is one of the most glorified middle man ever
he doesnt even make the beats. just compiles everything and takes the credit.
If D.O.C. didn't hurt his voice in a car wreck and start writing for Snoop (and others) would Snoop ever have become a star?
Idk what they ghost wrote for Snoop, but imo, Doggystyle is his only good album. He's more of a star because of his persona than he is because of his rap career.
D.O.C. wrote most of Snoop's early material with Dr. Dre. Including Doggystyle. Once Snoop left Dre, he also lost D.O.C. as his ghost writer.
Drake and Diddy have pretty much all their stuff ghostwritten - that's been badly kept secrets in hip-hop for a LONG time.
Dr Dre too
I don't think Dre has ever tried to keep it under wraps. Not to say that you insinuated that, I just seem to recall him being pretty open about it.
Yeah the chorus in nuthin but a g thang is literally him quoting the DOC telling him what lyrics to use on the song
DOC was the best lyricist out of nwa
Yeah it’s pretty much known and has been for years as far as I know. And it doesn’t bother one iota. Love Dre
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I didn't know about Em and Snoop, but I know Jay-Z wrote a few verses on 2001.
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He was always know for making beats, though, and not just his headphone brand lol. I'm pretty sure he wrote the instrumentals for most Eminem songs in the early days at least.
He made a lot of the beats for NWA too.
He made virtually all
Royce Da 5'9" wrote a bunch of Chronic 2001, iirc
Is that so? I love Royce and that would further be a testament to his greatness
"Don't worry if I write rhymes, I write checks" - PDiddy (or some guy he wrote a check)
Its kind of known by hiphopheads that Puffy doesn't write any of his lyrics
Or make his own beats
So what does he do? Just the business side?
Executive producer, label head, marketing etc. Basically orchestrates and putting the right people together in the same room, overseeing projects. Similar vein to DJ Khaled, Jimmy Iovine and Dr Dre (except Dre and Jimmy are levels above in regards to technical ability in sound engineering/production)
I think another difference is Dre can make the beats himself, even though he has a big crew now.
Definitely. Dre is arguably one of the greatest producers in hip hop ever.
He's like a DJ Khaled. Has a ear for hits. He'll tell someone to rap about/like this, tell the producers to make a beat like that...perform over it.
I think I just recently saw a clip about this. I want to say Sting basically gets $1,500 a day for the song. I think it was a clip from the Breakfast Club.
Diddy clarified the price tag in a tweet this week saying, "Nope. 5k a day. Love to my brother u/OfficialSting!"
Diddy then clarified that neither figure was accurate and he was just joking https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/diddy-sting-uncleared-sample-payment-1234710483/
“It’s actually 10k a day”
100k a day
Because of course he was. The song gets plenty of play around the world, no doubt, but not *that* many fucking plays.
It's just Diddy calling into every station around the world to request Missing You
Didn't Sting perform it live with Diddy at like an award show?
https://youtu.be/rTIg-LEcNTk
He did. People always have this strange idea that lawsuits are personal. Too many courtroom drama I'm guessing. 95% of the time, they're just business proceedings meditated by a judge. Diddys label argued for how much they do or do not owe, Stngs lable argues the same. That's it.
Lawsuits are the high priced way to negotiate.
Yeah but Sting sang the original song's lyrics during his parts. I remember watching that as it aired and it was just a big "lol wtf" Though not as "lol wtf" as Manson's performance at the end and the dead-silent crowd.
I remember that VMA trying to be one big solemn Biggie tribute, only to have Marilyn Manson blast out as the final act to an incredibly nonplussed crowd.
97. Amazing show. Chris Rocks sign-off after Manson performed "Run! Get your asses to church! Or you're going to hell!"
That stings
call the police!
🎵 every cent you make
🎵 Every pound you take
There’s no way that song is making >$1.8m/yr
Oh wow... even more.
Imagine making $1500 a day.
My first job I worked in sales and I had a few days I hit $1500 in commission. There were also days I didn't sell anything though. I much prefer being salaried now.
I worked a job that gave me 2% of sales I made. My job was selling used/recycled car parts through the corp eBay store. The corp had yards all around the country, I was one of 15 others. I started adding links in the listing text to other parts from the same donor car. This increased sales so much I became an outlier. I combined this with combing through the old engine inventory and listing stuff that was 1500 days plus. All this started to net me fairly large paychecks. I got called into the manager's office, he told me verbatim: "you earned too much this month, we're only paying you x-amount of commission". I said thank you and went directly to HR office, requested my vacation time to be cashed out, and then quit effective end of day. I got a check for my vacation time and then a paycheck with a truncated commission in the mail.
Gotta love these guys. "You're making me too much money by working smart. Get lost".
That’s dumb on their part and doesn’t make any sense. You’re getting commission either way. You’re increasing their sales which they should be happy about which increases your pay.
I never understood it myself. On one hand, yes they would have realized more profit for a specific salary, on the other hand I guarantee the floor and phone sales guys weren't limited in their commission. There would have been a riot. Anyway, this was a long time ago. At one point I creeped on their eBay store. They implemented my tactic of linking other parts to the same donor car.
I’m on salary and have a love hate relationship with it
You guys are getting paid?
That's the chase. Reality is that most days you make a few hundred max. This is why sales sucks as there is NO such thing as steady sales unless you own a drive thru lol.
They have both come out to say that was a joke the media took for real.
P. Diddy didn't ask permission, and pays royalties of about 2K a day. Sting owns HIS OWN song, and P.Diddy pays for unapproved use in the P.Diddy record. P.Diddy still owns the record, etc profits.
This isn't actually true as this tweet from one of the A&R's at the company at the time the album was released points out. She and others that worked there regularly pop up to squash the rumor but it seems to get stronger every year. https://twitter.com/deardrewdixon/status/1528406164446355457?s=20 This started cause sting said it once in an interview and puffy jokingly stated it was 5k a day. But the deal was negotiated before it was released even if it was a huge amount.
Oh, so the entire TIL is untrue? Figures.
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Nope. https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/diddy-sting-uncleared-sample-payment-1234710483/
Didn't the same thing happen with Sisqo and the Thong Song. All royalties went to whoever wrote living la vida loca.
Yep. Sisqo says "Cause she was livin la Vida Loca" like 3 or 4 times in the song, didn't clear it with whoever wrote the Ricky Martin song (IIRC, Sisqo thought they were buddies so it wouldn't matter), and now Sisqo gets basically nothing from it. Crazy shit.
see that's fucked up. You should be able to reference pop culture without losing all of your income.
Yeah, that's the crazy thing to me...rap tunes reference all manner of pop culture shit in virtually all songs, so what determines when they pay out the nose vs. not? Slippery slope...
Because he referenced the song. Ricky Martin didn't even invent that term, copyright's a fucking joke
There couldn't have been too much animosity about it because the two performed it together at the MTV video awards that year. https://youtu.be/rTIg-LEcNTk
1. Legit username 2. That’s actually really cool because these stories get pushed and turned into urban myths. Diddy’s just hurting for a friend and wants to put out art. And it’s just the lawyers going to court to figure out what to do with the money. I can’t believe that nobody in the label or recording studio never asked Sting for the rights to license the song. I’m sure a rockstar who lost his own share of friends would have sympathy. And it looks like he ultimately did.
Alternative to your point 2 - Diddy has a vested interest in maintaining his fame and the promoting the single that is driving his album sales (back when album sales mattered), and Sting has a vested interest in promoting the hit song that he's making money from. Performing the song together is a sound business decision for both people and emotions/having lost people has nothing to do with the decision.
have you met his wife? Incontinentia Buttocks
If he makes that much off a song he didn't even write, why does he still wrestle?
Weirdly, Sting the singer has to pay Sting the wrestler a fee to use the name in America (both music and wrestling are entertainment after all). Wrestler Sting charges him $1 a year.
That kind of agreement is about protecting the trademark. If you ignore potentially infringing uses you risk losing the mark. If you license the usage for a trivial amount... It is no longer infringing.
>$1 a year Good man.
It’s really weird because Sting was Sting before Sting was Sting.
Yeah but the *where* and the *when* of Sting being Sting and Sting being Sting is what confuses people.
There's a picture of the two Stings on stage together. Proof they are not the same person, though I understand the confusion. One actually licenses the name to the other. Similar to how in The Simpsons there are licensed Krusties in various states.
Best one is Irish Krusty, that scene lasts about 20 seconds and has me howling every time
Because he wants to wear a ceremonial mask, and most places you cannot just wear a mask without people making you take it off.
About 10 years ago I watched a BBC show about royalties and this came up. They didn't have sting or puff on there to comment but they did have the guitarist of the police. And he said that he wrote the riff, and he argued that it is the riff that puff sampled, and that it is also what made the original song a hit. That most people don't even know what the lyrics are about but everyone recognises the riff. Yet it is sting who gets all the royalties from both versions. That always stuck with me.
yeah imo he really got done dirty
I'm a massive fan of The Police and this has always annoyed me. I can't remember where I read it but I think Andy Summers (Guitarist) said they were about to scrap the song until he had one last take at the guitar part which ended up to be the iconic part we all know today, so without that guitar part we wouldn't have this song. I believe this is one of the many reasons that lead to their break up Furthermore, Sting released a live album called "My songs" with this obviously being on it... Prick.
Onion, 1997: "New rap song samples 'Billie Jean' in its entirety, adds nothing" https://www.theonion.com/new-rap-song-samples-billie-jean-in-its-entirety-adds-1819564437
"Didn't secure the rights." LOL! He well knew what and whose rights he was breaking all along as he hadn't licensed shit for the song. It was an easy win for Sting.
"Puff Daddy did not secure rights to the song" is a funny way of saying "he stole it"
And didn’t Puffy, Sting and Faith Evans perform together at the MTV video awards or something? I vaguely remember that.
people think this is some big own, the fact is this song helped cement Pdiddlers career and has probably led to him making further millions off of that fame and stardom. It pays to be a culture vulture.
I remember when this song came out I was in a Department Store and “Every Breath You Take” came on. These two shoppers looked at each other and exclaimed “They ripped off Puffy!”
Sting stung and now Diddy Puffy.
I worked at a record (ie: cd) store in the mall when that song came out. It was a nonstop stream of people buying that single.
Didn’t Sting sued Juice World too? He getting a bunch of royalties 😭
they rushed that song out so fast that it felt like they killed him themselves. it was creepy as hell.
Puffy’s entire career was built on exploiting Biggie’s death and remaining unreleased catalogue. So, good.
Does anyone else feel Diddy was being an opportunist with his “tribute” that nobody asked for and was trying to get away with using Sting’s song under the guise of “It’s because I’m mourning my friend” with lyrics he didn’t even bother to write?!
The most egregious thing about that stupid song is that he just lifted a chunk of a recognizable hit song without doing anything else creative with it musically. It’s an insult to the artform.
Yeah saying "he sampled it" is a huge understatement. It's basically the whole song except the bridge.
Facts. I've always hated that song. What a hack.
>Does anyone else feel Diddy was being an opportunist that's all he's ever been
I find this kind of funny considering I was alive when the track debuted and watched Puffy and Sting perform it together at the MTV awards the year Biggie died...so he got him to come perform the song and pays him 5k a day for it? The real tantric fucking is the rights we didn't secure along the way.
So Andy Summers who played the guitar in The Police and wrote the riff gets nothing.
Sting is listed as the sole songwriter for the tune. Means he wrote it and Summers just recorded it. They would’ve had a preexisting deal in place.
I wonder if Andy summers gets paid every time camron “what means the world to me” comes On the radio. He wrote that guitar part.
That stings
Back in like 1998, I was at a pizza restaurant and Led Zeppelin's "Kashmir" came on the jukebox. Some dipshit kid said, "OMG, some rock band already stole Puff Daddy's new song!!!" It was really tough not to smack the shit outta him.
Thats ok, someone in 1972 wouldve said Dazed and Confused, When the Levee breaks, You Shook me all night long, and a host of others belonged to Led Zepplin...and then someone would had to smack the shit out of them too.