When the Recording is Done, Then What? by George Ziemann -- November 27, 2008 If you're following the story so far, you know that I recorded The Hurricane a couple of weeks ago. I've still got a lot of work ahead of me, but the band is pretty much done with their end of the project. It's time for them to figure out what they want to do with it when I'm done. I'm not on this album (but I do have clearance to add keys to one track if I want), but I'm going to do the publishing details and I'm the default owner of the sound recording. Not actually being in the band that made the recording puts me in an odd spot because I can't just decide for them, as I would be able to do with the Hayden's Wall tracks, for instance. No matter what, there are a few steps we need to go through. Copyright The rough tracks can be used to submit the songwriting copyrights (Form PA). In this case, I've got three songs by Carl, three by Tim and one that appears to be co-written. So far, this can be done with three copyright forms. The problem is that 7 songs is not an album and, although we have about 70 additional acoustic recordings of great songs that will easily make up the difference, those other tracks have to be decided upon and, if not already copyrighted, will need to be added to the batches. Tim's songs may have already been copyrighted. The sound recording copyright can't happen until it's a done deal. So it's still too early to do the copyrights in the most cost-efficient manner. ASCAP It's not too early for my songwriters to join a performing rights organization. I have issues with ASCAP's positions, but the bottom line is that, should miracles happen and one of their songs were to get enough attention to collect royalties for the song, if you're not registered with ASCAP or BMI, no one will collect them for you. In our case, I would still get paid the publisher's share. ASCAP is free to join, that's where I registered, that's where I'll register the songs, that's where I advised Cara Hayden and Tim to join (I have enough Cara songs to put together a separate album). We need to get publishing agreements for the material that will be released. This should be straightforward. It's supposed to be a 50/50 deal between the publishers and songwriters. The main things to worry about is if we are going to confine the agreement to specific songs or just do a blanket agreement. And whether it's exclusive. Artwork We haven't had a word of discussion on cover art, much less any additional features to add to the package. We did take some video footage of the recording process, but not nearly enough. Sales/Distribution Here's where we start running into issues that I don't have an easy answer for. It seems a given that we're going to put this on iTunes. If we sell any copies at all, how should the money be divided? As we all know, the record labels give you a pile of money up front, take 85% of the income and your 15% will never quite manage to pay off the advance. Technically, I count as an independent record label, but I certainly don't think like one. My goal is to write checks to my little group of artists, not figure out how to avoid it. So what is fair? One end of the spectrum would be a straight split between the three members of the band and myself, which would give me 25%. I think the other extreme would be to ask for the same 50/50 deal for sales that they're more than willing to give me for publishing. For consideration is the issue that their part was done two weeks ago and I'll be trying to push it for years. If I didn't know them, I would think that this was extremely reasonable. But I do know them. These guys are my friends. If the situation were reversed, I might be going, "Fifty percent???" As a result, I've asked the band to kick it around, remember that their work is done, and pick a number somewhere in that that 25-50% range, and I'll write an agreement for the one recording, which will leave all of us an opportunity to change it for the next one. Once that issue is decided, there are still a number of questions that we have never talked enough about. I've got opinions, but I don't know how the band feels. Physical CDs -- Tim mentioned this during the sessions. Some of us are going to want a physical copy, but is it really worth having 500 or 1,000 printed? Or should we burn off copies as needed, in the spirit of the indie DIY movement? It's not like there are record stores. Reaching The Audience -- Live gigs might sell a few CDs, or might attract some attention, except that they are in Arizona. They'd almost have to go on the road opening for a major act for that to be worthwhile. Seems easier to put out a YouTube video, not to mention that it would certainly reach a wider audience. Using iTunes allows us retail access to the entire US, Canada, Europe, the UK, Australia and New Zealand. Playing for 500 or 1000 people as an opening act in an Arizona venue will be fun and it will feel good, but that small potential following seems to overlook entire continents. Paid advertising has already been suggested, and finding critics that might review the new album. I won't get to these things until I'm done producing it, Whether they play live, how often, and for how much, we still need to get something together that can reach the rest of the world. To my thinking, it would be infinitely more productive to do one well-staged show and film it with multiple cameras, as opposed to dragging your ass and two tons of gear back and forth across the country. I've seen several bands on YouTube that appeared to be very good, as well as you can tell from a cell-phone video. If they were in-focus, used a decent audio track and a couple of other cameras for close-ups and point-of-view transitions, it would seem like a better show than what the guy with the cell-phone saw. To me, this makes watching the video preferable to trying to catch an act at a club -- cuz I'll have a seat behind Mr. Cell, who will stand there blocking my view all night. A good argument to this is that if you do go to the club, you might be able to actually talk to the band. Free copies -- My current viewpoint remains unchanged over what made sense to me 6 years ago. Give away 128k files and point people to where to find higher quality versions. There are many more things to consider, but this is the basic group of top priority items. If you're going to put out a recording outside the major label system, you need to think about all of these things. I should have forced these guys to iron out the agreement before we recorded instead of negotiating some of the points after the fact. But they've already given me their performances; I've given them my mobile recording and production services at no charge, which I consider to be my most valuable skill. The most important thing when we all get together is making more music. It's hard to nail them down on many of these other things, because time spent on the business matters is time not spent recording and there is still a substantial number of songs in the Hurricane catalog that haven't even been recorded yet, much less offered for sale. Until this summer, a pain-free path to sell digital tracks was hard to come by. With services like Tunecore now available, it's infinitely easier to put your songs where people might actually buy them. I think the upcoming album will turn out quite well. So far, everyone who has listened to the playback of the raw, unedited tracks has said they sound good just the way they are. The problem is that making a great album is not enough. It's a good place to start, though.