Eric German: The RIAA vs Napster, Producer Agreements, and Why Bands Get Fucked by Labels

Speaker 1 (00:00:00):

Welcome to the Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast, brought to you by two notes. Audio Engineering two notes is a leader in the market for load box cabinet, and mic simulators garner the days of having iso rooms or having to record an amp at ear bleeding volumes to capture that magic tone. The torpedo live reload and studio allow you to crank your amp up as loud as you want, but record silently. Check out www do two-node.com for more info. And now your host,

Speaker 2 (00:00:33):

Eyal Levi. I am Eyal Levi, and with me is someone that I have known for a very long time and who I have been told to fear for a very long time, but I've never known him in a way that I should fear him. I've always known him as just a badass, intelligent guy that I should be on good terms with rather than fear and a good person to know because from everything I've ever known about him, he's one of the most prolific entertainment attorneys in the world, period. One of the most knowledgeable too, and also one of the most approachable because I don't know how many of you guys have had the fortune of having to look for an entertainment lawyer maybe before you were signed or before you had a career and knock out in your calls return. Eric is a very, very humane lawyer and a very cool dude. So let me introduce you, Mr. Eric German. Thank you for being here.

Speaker 3 (00:01:39):

Thank you very much. That's a wonderful introduction. And all I can say is a leopard can hot spots. So I think sometimes when you look at the legal community, I feel like I come from the music world and so there it can only just be myself, and I really appreciate you having me on.

Speaker 2 (00:01:58):

Well, you seem to really love music. Then see the places that I've bumped into you the most have been you out and about, not necessarily shopping for bands or anything, just out and about enjoying nightlife, enjoying music, just having fun. And occasionally I'll see you in a conference room at a label or something, but by and large, my interactions have been Eric's out having fun, enjoying the music life.

Speaker 3 (00:02:30):

Well, you have to do what you love, right? And they say, if you do what you love, you don't work a day in your life. And I grew up a metalhead kid hanging out at Bonfires in the woods with a boombox listening to the Slayer, and it just became my life. I obviously went to law school and did very well in law school and had the luxury at some point of finding a way to synthesize the two worlds, the passion for what started the passion for heavy metal music and became the passion for music and the music business generally. Being able to do that for a living to feed my family, pay my mortgage, and have a career in music is a great blessing. It's really, really fun. Fun is definitely the right word.

Speaker 2 (00:03:18):

Did you go straight into entertainment law?

Speaker 3 (00:03:21):

Well straight. I went to college. I grew up, if you want to go way back, I grew up in upstate New York playing in hair down in my ass, playing in Metallica, derivative metal bands, right? In fact, I just saw Jason Bitner joint Overkill as the new drummer, if you guys know the thrash metal band, overkill. And that was a guy that I have a tape in a drawer of a rehearsal that we were jamming with Jason. We were playing overkill covers in probably 1987, something like that. But I loved it. I mean, I was in it where other kids were working on cars and other kids were out messing around and other kids were into sports. I took three guitar lessons a week for five years in my teens and did everything I could to play music. So when you say did I go right into law, I went to college, I come from an academic family. I went to Syracuse University in 1988, and by the way, God bless rest of soul, Chris LL passed away.

Speaker 4 (00:04:26):

Oh man, I

Speaker 3 (00:04:27):

Dunno when this is going to come out, but

(00:04:29):

Somebody, a lot of my college friends are talking about us going to see a show with Chris with Soundgarden opening for VO back in 1990. And that just reminds me of all the shows I saw, I mean, I've seen it all. I've seen Metallica with Cliff Burton, I've seen made on the Power Slave tour, Jewish Priest, black Sabbath, born Again, and cool stuff. So I just lived all that stuff. And when I went to Syracuse University in 1988 and graduated in 1992, in the middle of that, apropos of what happened last night, Seattle grunge happened and just killed unquote metal dead. And I was looking for ways to connect with the community that I had left behind and my old friends, I went to school and it was much more, I guess the terms we used back then was sort of jock, preppy type atmosphere in college.

(00:05:23):

I joined a fraternity and all that stuff and I had a great time and have lots of wonderful college friends, but I missed the ability to connect with metal. And by the time head banger's, ball wound down and metal wasn't on the radio anymore after Nirvana sort of killed metal dead. It was hard to, I still wanted to get the new overkill record or the new sabotage record, and there wasn't too many people that wanted to discuss that with me. So I found the internet and the earliest incarnations of the internet pre America online, there was something called CompuServe and Pro. Yeah, I found Dial.

(00:06:01):

Yeah. And I found these message boards use net news groups that were like alt, do metal dot heavy and stuff like that. And I started corresponding with kids in Europe and trading cassette tapes back and forth in the mail, and I was turned down to all of the European metal at the gates and all the Gothenberg scene stuff and flames, and then the American stuff like Ice Earth. And I was wondering where one of my favorite bands called Sanctuary had gone to. And I learned of Nevermore and all of this cool stuff in the nineties, and it got me to thinking about the idea that music was going to transform from physical to digital and that you could unite scenes and it wouldn't matter anymore if something was mainstream or if the radio conglomerates or television network executives decided to put something on the air because you could unite a scene.

(00:06:57):

And even if there was 50,000 people that cared about the Ice Earth record us, 50,000 people could find each other around the world through just crazy thing called the internet. So I became obsessed with the idea that I needed to learn everything I possibly could about copyright law, about music, about technology and the internet, and the most important place and the best place I could do that was in law school. So I worked for a concert promoter from 92 to 94, and in the fall of 94, I joined, and by the way, so many cool concerts we did back then, that's probably another conversation. But I went to Boston University School of Law in the fall of 1994 and paired up and became the research assistant for the leading copyright scholar, a woman named Wendy Gordon. And from there, just dove in, got my first email address and just became obsessed with this idea that music was all going to happen through a computer. And by the time I graduated in 97, it was really game on

Speaker 2 (00:07:58):

So you could really see the future.

Speaker 3 (00:08:00):

Well, I dunno if I saw the future, but I saw where I wanted to be and I saw, again, it's really kind of corny and you could call it prescient, but I love the idea. I was always probably questing, and I think what I was probably drawn to metal music was the idea of community and that bond that happens. You talk about the nightlife and going to shows to this day, I mean, to me, there's nothing better than standing next to George Valley. And I love George watching Metallica, which I'm about to do this weekend at Rock on the Ranch. To me, that bonding and that brotherhood and all that corny stuff that you learn as a kid, to me it was brothers in denim and leather forever. So I found a way to mold my academic upbringing. My parents and my whole family are very academic and collegiate and all that.

(00:08:55):

I found a way to meld that kind of learning. I always wanted to use my brain with the idea of how could I contribute to music. And in law school, I did very, very well, thank God. And because, probably because I did the same thing over and over. I wrote hundreds of papers and researched everything I could about what I called at the time, the Celestial Jukebox, which we call the cloud today, and the copyright implications of getting music through a computer. And by the time I was done, again, I went clerked for this judge on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. And then I got a job in New York City for a big law firm that had a client called the Recording Industry Association of America. And they were gearing up for a massive piece of litigation against a tech company called Napster. And because that seemed to be ground zero for the copyright wars, it was almost like my personal crusade. And I chose that firm and went to work there and became the baby lawyer on the Napster case. And I can keep going.

Speaker 2 (00:10:02):

This is fascinating, man. I had no idea. Well,

Speaker 3 (00:10:05):

Thank you.

Speaker 2 (00:10:05):

Am I talking about that a little more? No,

Speaker 3 (00:10:07):

Not at all. So I can talk about that case, which was obviously a big deal. CNN was covering every hearing. It was a cover of Time Magazine. I was the kid, the baby lawyer on the case, but I was right there in it. And by the time we won that case in the summer fall-ish, somewhere in 2001, I was living in New York and I think my wife Lauren. Oh yeah. And she and I had delivered for a time, but we were thinking about having a kid and

Speaker 2 (00:10:39):

Tell her, I say hi, by the way.

Speaker 3 (00:10:41):

I will. Thank you. I will. We were pretty interested in the possibility of having a kid, but maybe not doing so in New York. And then something happened, A couple planes hit the Twin Towers and New York suddenly became this repulsive, disgusting place for a moment where tanks were rolling down eighth Avenue and I could literally smell death wafting up between the buildings. And on September 18th, 2001, I interviewed for a job because one of the heads of civil litigation at the RIAA had gone and become a partner at a firm in Los Angeles called Mitchell Silberg and nep, where I'm currently a partner and I work now. And then the new work post Napster was moving to be centered there. They were taking on a company called Kaza.

Speaker 2 (00:11:28):

I remember them.

Speaker 3 (00:11:30):

So that case went to the Supreme Court of the United States and the recording industry won, and I left. I said, check please on New York City. At the end of September oh one, I moved out here, I started at my firm in 2002, worked on that case. After that case ended, the strategy changed and the recording industry now was going to sue grandmothers and teenagers and individual end users. And that was a big deal at the time. And I got named National Coordinating Counsel for end user lawsuits. And what was that that meant I was supervising litigation and 200 jurisdictions around the country and ghost writing briefs and helping local counsel deal with lots and lots and lots of very small cases against people who downloaded music. And for better or for worse, the politics of it all. And I don't want to be too critical of the industry or a client, but for me personally, it wasn't exactly where I wanted to be, where that kind of defense of heavy metal music. And I think I appreciated the creative aspects of music a lot more that I wanted not to be the internet police, but instead I want it to be closer to the creative process and to making cool things happen. And so

Speaker 2 (00:12:44):

Yeah, you don't strike me as the dude who wants to sit there and give away penalties to people for,

Speaker 3 (00:12:53):

It's sort of like traffic tickets. And yes, people are going to always speed, but if there's a cop sitting in the bushes handing out a ticket every once in a while, maybe people will slow down. But that wasn't what I was put on the circuit to do, but it was literally what I was doing. So at that point, I probably met you somewhere around there when I moved out to la

Speaker 2 (00:13:14):

Yeah, we've met sometime in the past 10 ish years.

Speaker 3 (00:13:19):

So at that point I got kind of a little disillusioned with what I was doing and frankly, a couple cool things happened. I got the opportunity to work on a really cool case that we brought in for a major video game company and a big first amendment case. And I had a couple of big wins, worked for another piece of litigation for a big television show and a lot of stuff for major recording artists and all of it win after win and high profile copyright thing. I got the sort of anointed I got made partner at my firm, and that happened in January of 2007. And that allowed me some flexibility and freedom to change things up and do what I wanted to do. And my first thing I was doing around that time was focusing on independent music. I noticed that the internet had leveled the playing field that indie bands and labels were having a lot more success.

(00:14:19):

And those labels, they may have number one records or top 10 records, but they didn't have armies of in-house counsel already at the helm so they could afford my services due to their success and the success. And at the same time, they had the ability to, or they didn't have people on retainer or on staff. And so started taking on label side representation for indies for a long period of time. And I actually went to bring up Bitner again, and not to make too much of him, but he was playing a show with shadows fall opening for a damage plan at the House of Blues in Los Angeles. And this was probably a couple weeks before Dime died because I remember when did, I don't know when Dime died,

Speaker 2 (00:15:06):

2004 I think,

Speaker 3 (00:15:08):

Or five. Okay. So somewhere around there I met probably because I remember we went out to the Rainbow, we're hanging with Dime and Vinny afterwards. It was a super cool night, but Oliver ov, who was the president of Central Media Records, and Robert Cos were there because Shallows Fall was having amazing success at that time. And we had gone to the show and we were kind of in the dressing room, Jacob Beers and I met these guys. I started talking to them about what I was doing and what my background was. And I think they were impressed that I knew all the bands and I knew the music, yet I had the background that I had and that I was so passionate about their label. And they had a few different issues that they needed help with. They brought me on to solve, by the way, in this moment, just got their first gold record.

Speaker 2 (00:15:55):

I saw that

Speaker 3 (00:15:55):

Gold record this week, and I recall way back at the beginning of that time,

Speaker 2 (00:15:59):

Congratulations to everybody involved with that,

Speaker 3 (00:16:02):

Right? It's a big deal. And this moment had some particular legal issues is they were just starting to come out with their debut. And I had stepped in because I knew a guy named Blasco who was managing the band at the time. And of course I had the relationship with the label. They brought me into handle that and that went well. And it just started a relationship with Century Media where they put me on a retainer and I became sort of their quasi go-to guy for a little while there. And that relationship persists today, but they taught me everything. And at one point, Robert and Oliver just kind of invested in me and taught me all the labels. I mean from the label perspective, all of what a record deal looks like and how to do all that. And I guess at that point I had gotten pretty excited about the idea of working with artists Again, I was working with these independent labels.

(00:17:00):

I helped to at the beginning, helped to put together something called the American Association of Independent Music. It's labeled a two IM and I'm counsel to them to this day. And that's, I think at this time it's 400 and Change maybe pushing 500 American record labels. It's trade association based out of New York City. They're putting on an event next month, the Indie Music Week, and something called the Berra Awards, which is kind of like the Independent Spirit Awards is to film for music. So it's pretty cool stuff. And that's great organization. I got involved with something called Merlin at its inception. Merlin is a rights licensing organization, a digital rights licensing organization for thousands of record labels worldwide. And they negotiate the deals with all of the big players in digital music, including Spotify and earlier MySpace and YouTube and Beats and things like that.

(00:17:55):

So getting to work with those companies with Century Media, those other two companies, I just learned a ton of label side indie music. And I still wasn't working with artists directly, but at some point I got hired work on a case for a band called Metal Shop who changed their name to Metal School who became Steel Panther, and that was one of the first artists I ever worked with. It was a great experience to work with them. I still work with them to this day. And from there, it just opened the floodgates and I started working with artists and bands and producers and publishers and the whole deal. And today, I think I represent about 37 artists. I have a few producer clients, some publishing clients, some songwriters, a lot of them in hard rock and heavy metal, but also some hip hop, some alt indie rocks, some EDM cool stuff,

Speaker 2 (00:18:55):

Roster's full

Speaker 3 (00:18:56):

Indeed.

Speaker 2 (00:18:57):

Well, that's quite a story. I didn't know some of that about your story, the more you learn.

Speaker 3 (00:19:04):

Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, I know a lot about you. I've watched your rise and your success. It's been very, very cool. Thank you. In fact, I particularly remember going to a warp tour somewhere, Pomona or something like that, and you had just produced a record that was really popping off. And I remember seeing you and just feeling a sense of pride because clearly you elevated yourself, you took things into your own hands. You said, this is what I'm going to do. I mean, I think I knew you when you were doing doth from you were on Roadrunner.

Speaker 2 (00:19:39):

Yeah. Then we got switched over to Century

Speaker 3 (00:19:41):

To century

(00:19:42):

And I remember all of that experience because one of my very good friends was the in-house counsel at Roadrunner, and I was doing a lot of work for them. And I watched you go from that situation into something a lot more elevated. And it was super cool. And I was listening to your podcast with Doc Coyle and I listened to the recent one with Blasco as well. And I could just hear the theme coming across and how you have that mutual respect and they have that respect for you of people that find a way to reinvent themselves along the way. So it's been a cool ride. And I guess that's the cool thing about getting older is it gives you perspective, right? You can see the whole story, not just the first chapter of the book, but we're getting a good taste of it.

Speaker 2 (00:20:26):

The way I see it in lots of ways I see it is imagine if I was 37 that I am now and it was still trying with my band and we weren't much bigger than we were then. Time had elapsed the same way except I was older and we were older and we were still trying to get that second out of five slot or the first out of four slot, or maybe still paying tour support to get that direct support slot in Europe for Fear Factory or something. And no, no,

Speaker 3 (00:21:05):

Brutal. Does that meme going around right now though? It's been for years. Do you see where it shows the girl that says You're in a band?

Speaker 2 (00:21:12):

I know that meme, that meme's hilarious. That meme is hilarious. I stopped with the band when I was 30 or 31 and because it was just like, okay, I've done it enough's enough. There's factors outside of my control, which will determine how big the band could get wrong place, wrong time with society. You can't control that kind of stuff the way that Mitch was.

Speaker 3 (00:21:39):

You can try,

Speaker 2 (00:21:40):

You can try, but there's only one niche from suicide silence, right?

Speaker 3 (00:21:45):

Timing is a huge issue

Speaker 2 (00:21:47):

With

Speaker 3 (00:21:47):

All of this. And I can tell you that when I see bands come across, come through my office all the time because people think that all they have to do is meet someone who's connected and that will take care of everything for them. But that is one of the biggest myths slash fictions in music. I can't make your band be popular.

(00:22:07):

I can pour gasoline on the flame, I can connect the dots, I can take something that's happening. If people are reacting to your music, people are pulling out their wallets and spending money on you. If people are genuinely enthused, like your friends and family beyond that, they literally want to listen to this for entertainment. But that's, you did that. I didn't do that. You give that to me and I can make something happen and get you paid. But if that's not happening, there's nothing I can do. And I get a parade of people coming through my office trying to think that that's what they need. They met me out somewhere or they know a friend or something. Can you help me? The answer is I can provide legal services. Yeah, that's not your job. Register your trademarks. I can't get you a record deal necessarily, and I certainly can't make you be famous.

(00:23:00):

But with those people sometimes I try to get to the heart of what is it that you really want, man? What is this urge to be on stage? I mean, I've always wondered why Some people you see out, you see groupies or something, and they're so excited about the guy that played bass on the second ski level, death metal album. And I don't understand what is it about this glamor that both the fans, I mean, but obviously that's where music is fueled. That's the economy of music is fueled on this unrealistic doesn't make sense, not logical, just passion for this stuff. And again, I just told you my whole life was built upon that passion. I understand. But I try to say to these people, what is it that you want? Do you want to be famous? Do you want to? And some bands will say, I could probably get you in Revolver Magazine and you could play the third stage of download and maybe you're lucky you get on a Wimmer Fest and probably get you a deal with label, yada, yada yada.

(00:24:01):

And is that what you want? Is that going to fill that hole inside? I don't know. But the few people asking for your autograph, is that what you want? And when you get into your thirties and you start to get older, you wonder what is the goal? What is the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow? Because no matter where you were, as you turn 30 with your band, there's always someone bigger. There's always some other level you're going to think you can ascend to. And sometimes I really enjoy this philosopher guy named Alan Watt. I dunno if you've ever listened to this. He's the father of modern Zen or whatever they say in America, and he was a lecturer at some university in the forties, and you could find some of his stuff online. And he talks about, it takes kind of Eastern philosophy and boils it down to practical modern day western culture life.

(00:24:57):

And the South Park animators, Trey and Matt did some animation to one of his lectures and one of them is called Music is Life or life is Music or something like that. And you can go on YouTube and see this little cartoon video of South Park type animation to this lecture. And the point of it really is you got to enjoy yourself along the way. You got to have fun. That's the real point. There's no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. The rainbow is the journey. And not to be too much of a hippie, but if you got into your thirties and you were finding that this isn't for me, I really don't need to play this club second of five for no money and live in a van and fart on my band mate's heads and fight with people and scrap and be homeless when I get home, that makes a lot of sense. And everyone I think has to go through that and figure out is that what they really want out of life? And it's really an interesting thing. Meanwhile though, on the flip side, I just give a shout out, there are some guys that I would label Your age doc is in it. John Berkland from Devil Driver is in it, a guy named Tommy V singing, they got a new band called Bad Wolves. They're all a certain age, they're launching a band right now. It's pretty cool. It's pretty cool.

(00:26:18):

It might do something right.

Speaker 2 (00:26:20):

The riffs are phenomenal.

Speaker 3 (00:26:22):

I'm going to be managed by a pretty big guy in the industry. I don't know if I want to be the one to say it or if everybody already knows, but it looks like it's going to go or at least going to go at some little level. And Brooklyn's a friend, doc's a friend, Tommy's a friend, what are they looking for? What do they want? What can be achieved at 30 something? I don't know. But we're going to find out what they want to do and I'm in a business of facilitating that and hopefully I'll put a few dollars in my pocket along the way

Speaker 2 (00:26:50):

And good for them too. The thing with what they're doing also is that the music sounds fresh. It's a fresh approach for all of them. They all have had a little while to, I guess, relax the soul after leaving their main projects. And maybe they're just not done. Maybe they're just not done. Relax in soul. Yeah,

Speaker 3 (00:27:13):

People are attracted to people that are comfortable in their own skin and music is, there are so many analogies, even though I was married at 22, there are so many analogies, damn young son that you'll see in the world. And because you're out there seeking approval, you want people to like you, you're putting yourself out there. And as at some point, I think that people, they either like it or they don't. But when you say that somebody relaxes the soul, I think people that think if it just feels real, you can call it authenticity, you can call it being comfortable in your own skin. You can call it doing it for the right reasons. But when people are making music, it's just rad with the focus on it being rad and just letting it come, letting it flow, letting it come to you. I think that's a breeding ground for success.

Speaker 2 (00:28:11):

I completely agree. So I am with that. I am actually curious to see what they do with this.

Speaker 3 (00:28:16):

Yeah, I think it's going to be a good ride, at least in the immediate term. The prospects look good.

Speaker 2 (00:28:23):

I can certainly understand that. What I've heard sounds great. And I know

Speaker 3 (00:28:27):

When does this air al

Speaker 2 (00:28:29):

This will probably air within a couple of weeks.

Speaker 3 (00:28:31):

I think Tuesday of next week, they play their debut show at Jose Mangan Metal Night in SoCal.

Speaker 2 (00:28:39):

Oh, nice.

Speaker 3 (00:28:40):

I'll be there maybe Tuesday, maybe Wednesday, I can't remember. I believe it's the 24th of May, but

Speaker 2 (00:28:45):

Well, this will be within a week of that.

Speaker 3 (00:28:46):

So then I'm sure if you're listening to this right now, you can go online and look at Bad Wolves videos on YouTube and see if it was any good or not.

Speaker 2 (00:28:55):

Yeah, yeah. Look it up. And I know how he wrote some of those riffs. So one of the best riff writers in Metal for a long time is in that band.

Speaker 3 (00:29:05):

And people don't know that John Berkland

Speaker 2 (00:29:07):

Wrote

Speaker 3 (00:29:07):

Most of the Dell driver stuff wrote

Speaker 2 (00:29:10):

And played,

Speaker 3 (00:29:10):

Right? Even though he's the drummer, he's known for being a drummer, a guy multifaceted, musical talent for sure.

Speaker 2 (00:29:17):

Yeah. He's a monster of a talent. I'm bringing him on the podcast in a couple of weeks just to get to the bottom of it because man, that guy is so talented, so talented.

Speaker 3 (00:29:32):

There's some guys in their thirties that are still making hay

(00:29:36):

Even though they're not playing arenas. One of the things I found too, I recently was involved in a very large alternative rock band that made a change with a former member. And I was thinking about these guys and thinking about that process and thinking about what happens to a higher gun as they get to a certain age. And it's the same thing that happens at small indie record label. When you hire a young publicist or something, these people are doing it for passion. They want to be on stage, they want to be in the business, they want be involved with the scene or whatever that is. And they get to a certain age though. It's kind of like a girl that wants to get married or a guy that wants to get married and they're significant. Their partner says, Hey, I don't want to get married or I don't want to have kids.

(00:30:22):

We're just having fun. But that can only last for so long because unrealized expectations pop up every single time. And at some point, many years have gone by and you've been a publicist at this Indy Metal label for 10 years, or you've been a hired gun in a band for seven years, or you've been dating someone with no strings attached from many, many. And at some point you said, wait a minute, I wanted something else. There was nowhere to grow. This has a national natural shell life and I'm frustrated. I'm angry, I'm mad at, but no one lied to you. No one told you, bill. Again, they told you what it was. There's no senior, senior, senior publicist at the individual label. You're not going to grow to $350,000 a year. There's just nowhere. The job is what it is, the gig to be the touring musician in the big alternative rock band.

(00:31:19):

It just is what it is. It's not your band man. And at some point these people grow to resent the situation they're in. So I think that's a reason why it's really difficult. If you get into your thirties and you haven't and you're not playing arenas, you basically, most people either hang it up or they're five fingers, death punch at a certain point or Slipknot or Aven or Metallica or whatever. And to be starting out on a club level at a certain age, you got to really love music. And that, I think is what's happening with these guys anyway.

Speaker 2 (00:31:55):

I don't love it that much.

Speaker 3 (00:31:59):

Well, you're clearly immersed in it and doing a lot of cool stuff around it and certainly

Speaker 2 (00:32:04):

Helping

Speaker 3 (00:32:05):

Other people learn.

Speaker 2 (00:32:06):

I love what I'm doing, but by the time I got done touring, I was over it. I had said what I had wanted to say. I did what I wanted to do. Unfortunately, my band didn't get bigger than it did. But a lot of stuff was out of my control. The stuff we did get to do was dream come true, got to tour the world various times, put out three records on great labels on the cover of magazines, got on Headbangers Ball, got to tour Japan, did Oz Fest, played European festivals. I mean, what can I say, man?

Speaker 3 (00:32:43):

And the funny thing is, that's all there is, man. Yeah, you watch my, I mean, that's all there is besides the stupid level, whether you're just taking bas of cash and houses and yachts and cars and planes. But for the most part, that is success, dude. And that's what I'm saying about that Aam wat thing. The last line of it is life is a song. It's music, and you're supposed to be singing and dancing along the way, right? You're supposed to be enjoying it. And if that's not fun for you, don't be doing that in order to get somewhere else, somewhere else. Probably never coming do that because you want to do that and don't do that anymore when you don't.

Speaker 2 (00:33:24):

Well, what I've realized, I think you're exactly right, is if we're a tour with a bigger band or share a bus with them, the only difference between us and them is the size of the check at the end of the night. And maybe they got two more pizzas. In

Speaker 3 (00:33:41):

My wonderful aunt who I told you my grandmother passed away last night in addition to Chris Cornell, and I'm here in Ohio because I come to Rock on the Range, which is my favorite US festival. It's not super heavy, but it's definitely super cool. And the vibe is there and the industry is there and the people to meet are there. And this one's headlined by my standard band of all time, which I'll still boldly proclaim is Metallica. It was also supposed to be headlined by Sound Garden. They were supposed to play tomorrow night. But I'm here in Ohio also because I come to see my grandmother who was nine, five years old, and I spent a lot of time with her and I always tie in that trip and she passed away yesterday, but amazing lady. But moving, I'm here with my family and there's a lot of heavy emotions and cool feelings going on, and I'm talking to you now from my aunt's house, and my other aunt always told me who's also here, they had some success in life. They started to have some nice things, a little bit of money. And I remember saying to her, what's it like being excited? You have said, man, everybody has a table. Everyone has a chair, everyone has a car, everyone has a dish. I just have a little bit nicer table, a little bit nicer chair. It's really not that big a deal. And that stuck with me. That was when I was a little kid. Always remember

Speaker 2 (00:35:08):

That's exactly how I felt about it. So on the off chance that we get as big as devil driver or something, which wouldn't happen, but on the off chance that we're the next go Jira, how much bigger does it really get than what we've already done? So okay, maybe the bus will be our own and the money at the end of the night will be a little bigger and we'll get to play a little longer. But those things aside, the day in, day out of it all is exactly the same.

Speaker 3 (00:35:39):

I can say I've done a lot of shit in music. I've done, I've been in recording studios, I've helped write lyrics, I've picked album art, I've debated band members. I've clearly done a lot of stuff legal. I've been in recording studios, taken audio classes, worked in a record store when those used to happen. I've unquote managed bands as a kid. I've played music. You know what I've never done. I've never spent one night on a tour bus and I never will. I mean, don't never say never, right? But it's not appealing to me. It's not interesting to me. I want to go home and have my space. I couldn't do it. I just couldn't do it.

Speaker 2 (00:36:14):

I wanted to

Speaker 3 (00:36:15):

Hats off to those of you who could,

Speaker 2 (00:36:16):

Man. When I was in a van, I wanted to be on that bus so bad. Then when I got on the bus, I was like, hell yeah, I'm on a bus. But then after a while it was like, okay, I'm on a bus, whatever. It's just you got to be in it for the right reasons. Your heart's got to be in the music. If your heart's on the music, nothing else is worth it.

Speaker 3 (00:36:34):

Listen, if my heart wasn't in music, I should be litigating tech cases. I talked to one of my old colleagues from law school and I said earlier, I did very, very well in law school. I was the editor of my law review and I had all these great opportunities and I reconnected after 20 years with someone I had dinner with recently, and he became a patent litigator. He's at a massive firm working for top stuff, doing patent litigation for major major tech companies. I don't want to drop all the names of what I'm about to say, but he said to me that one client on one matter last month, he billed a half million dollars. Jesus. I looked at him and I was like, I had better grades than you in law school, dude. No, I'm kidding. And he split the tab with me at dinner. But I was thinking about that. I could have done that, but I dunno, I had to do this. Does that make sense? Again, a leopard can't hide it spots, and I'm a leopard, unfortunately.

Speaker 2 (00:37:35):

Absolutely.

Speaker 3 (00:37:35):

I love this stuff. I have to do it.

Speaker 2 (00:37:38):

Fair enough. So I've got some questions here from our audience for you. Do you mind if we go down some of them? No,

Speaker 3 (00:37:45):

Please.

Speaker 2 (00:37:46):

Okay, so here's one from Austin, which is what's the biggest mistakes you see producers and engineers make when working with labels and big name artists?

Speaker 3 (00:37:58):

Well, I mean, if they're working with big name artists, they must already have a track record of a relationship, right? You've got to keep those relationships. I see guys kind of try to big dog situations and over-leverage in terms of, I'm holding onto the stems or I want this, or I refuse to do this until that work with people, man, it's rock and roll and sometimes it takes a minute to get the agreements together. Sometimes there's a little bit of a dynamic between the and R guy, the manager, the lawyers, Europe, the producer's manager. You got to let that stuff flow. I think the biggest mistake you can do is queer, the creative with too much business, right? Surround yourself. If you're working with major artists, surround yourself with business people. You can have that pure relationship with the artists and you can focus on making a great record or making great music.

(00:38:49):

Let the other people kind of buzz around each other and trip over each other to get it right. But that's on a big picture kind of forest level on a trees level. Let me give you something detailed. Figure out who's going to do things like submit the sound exchange letter of direction, figure out who's going to make sure you talk about songwriting splits if the producer is involved with songwriting above, over and beyond just producing the record think details on. So I guess to tie the two things together, sure you pay attention to the details of how the money's going to flow and who gets what and be clear about that, but at the same time, turn all that over to your representatives and let them handle it.

Speaker 2 (00:39:32):

I agree. So here's a question from Rodney Alten Bow, and he said, I'll just give it to you in two parts. He said, biggest essentials needed to keep our asses safe. And I said, come on dude, give me more than that. And then he said, the thing is, I don't know where to start with legal stuff, so I don't even know what to ask. So what are big things we need to worry about?

Speaker 3 (00:39:59):

Well, let's talk first and foremost, what kind of deal are you doing?

Speaker 2 (00:40:03):

He's got a home studio bands come to record at his place.

Speaker 3 (00:40:07):

Is that band paying you a flat fee? First, you want to figure out are they paying you a flat fee to take away a creative product that they own at the end? Are they coming to you for songwriting? Are they coming to you just for production? You want to figure those things out. You want to also think about, is this something you're doing on spec or is this something they're paying you upfront for? Or are they going to pay you if they get a record deal? And if so, what are the terms of that going to be? Those are kind of the essentials, really. How many songs are you doing? How much are you getting paid upfront? How much of that is recording costs versus so-called producer advance? Are you getting backend points? What is the situation with songwriting? How do you want to be credited? The rest is kind of details.

Speaker 2 (00:40:54):

Great. Luis, Jamie Flores wondering if I do cover songs on YouTube, what measures should I take to make sure I don't get any copyright infringement issues?

Speaker 3 (00:41:07):

I mean, first of all, let's just talk about the basis of copyright, right? It is a serious issue that the distinction between a cover and an interpolation. Everybody knows that you can cover anybody's music that's already been released by getting a so-called statutory mechanical license, which under the Copyright Act allows you to perform. So if I want to do Van Halen vain talking about love, the death metal version, I can do it. You can't change it and make what's called a derivative work. You can't go too far. But if you're doing a quote straight cover, you just pay a fee and register with the Harry Fox Organization or something like that and you, and you're go to go YouTube creates on the other end of the spectrum what you can't do with a cover though. And there is no statute. And by the way, what I mean by statutory license is important.

(00:42:00):

Statutory means it's already pre-agreed set by law, and anyone can do it. You don't need permission of the original authors to do it, right? That's the cool part. What's called a sync license means when you take audio visual works and you synchronize them to audio sounds. So if you're creating a music video or if you're putting a song in a television commercial or a film or a television show, something like that, if you're syncing up music to audio visual IE pictures, moving pictures, that requires a different license sync license. So if you do that cover and you get that statutory mechanical license and you're doing the death metal version of ain talking about love, you can't make a video without their permission. You do have to go seek them and ask them to do that, right? So what about YouTube? Because YouTube is in effect the de fact of streaming music service for a lot of people.

(00:42:56):

What happens when you're getting that mechanical license, yet you're putting a video on YouTube that would be a violation of the sync license, right? And that would technically implicate copyright and you'd probably get flagged for it. I believe that people solve that or kind of a stop gap solution is to put it to what's called a static video, which is just a page just showing maybe the album cover. It's not synced to audiovisual even though it's streaming in a sense. And I'm not clear on YouTube's position on that, and I don't want to give anybody legal advice. I especially don't want to give anybody legal advice that's incorrect in, you're going to want to look into that. But as a basic thing, you can't sink a cover to a video, but there may be some rules, either maybe the workaround with a static visual image.

Speaker 2 (00:43:48):

Alright, John Tate was wondering, is it prudent to work of a producer's agreement ahead of time? Should the artist decide to switch producers halfway through a project, rework your demos or simply not pay you?

Speaker 3 (00:44:03):

Yes. Right? Yes. First of all, be clear, right? Whether it's in writing in an email, in a formal producer agreement, be clear. I think in all things in life, understand expectations. If I'm going to do any kind of real business with you, and mind you, you guys have the production part underhand. You guys have the creative, you're probably great at what you do and I'm sure it'll flow in the studio and you'll make some great music. All I'm commenting on is the business. And the business is don't forget to make sure you understand what your business deal is. So I don't see anything wrong with a band coming in, working with a producers siding. It's not working and going somewhere else. I rarely, if ever hear of exclusive unless it's kind of like a production deal. A band may start working with you and it might not be working out, and they may want to go try to cut some tracks for somebody else or cut the same tracks for somebody else. That happens.

Speaker 2 (00:45:02):

Not only does it happen, but it happens every day. It's normal thing

Speaker 3 (00:45:06):

You're doing work and you're expecting to be paid for that work. That's a different story. In other words, your rate in the studio is blank, dollars per day or whatever. Make sure you're clear on that ahead of time. Do you need a written agreement? I mean, look, let's be honest, on a low level, there's only are you really going to go sue somebody over one of these things? And a contract is really kind of like a prenup, right? In a sense that you're only going to pull it out of the drawer if something bad happens. So you're going into what seems like a cool situation. Only if there's a misunderstanding or there's some kind of dispute are you're going to be pointing to paragraph 12 B. And so if you're talking about real low money or real underground startup stuff, investing a ton into trying to put together formal agreements and stuff like that, you're going to have to do a cost benefit analysis on that, right?

(00:45:57):

But at the outset, doing something, just being clear about what the deal is and what your expectations are is probably a really good thing. I remember blood is thicker than water. And what do I mean by that? I mean that relationships are the real currency, especially when you're starting out. And so if you're in your first or second or third time producing and you're really just starting out and you're already suing people, so you're doing something wrong, you got to realize that at the beginning, the most important thing is going to be people's word with one another. And that goes for the bands too. So some band that's out there ripping you off that promise to pay you and it doesn't go somewhere else, that's not too cool. Look for them either. But at the end of the day, I would think that the most important thing for all of you is to maintain your reputation and live to fight another day. So keep that in mind. But to answer your question from square one, yeah, be clear about a deal. Make sure your expectations align with your customers.

Speaker 2 (00:47:02):

Andre Sin says, okay, I don't know if this is Eric's area of expertise, but as a Canadian musician, possibly a producer mixer, et cetera, what steps should I take for working, touring, mixing in the us? Do I need a work permit to record a band in the us?

Speaker 3 (00:47:24):

Yeah, I'm not going to give immigration advice here, but here's what I know. Our firm has archaic ass immigration department and we've done work visas for many, many, many, many creative people, some of which I'm sure people here are fans of.

Speaker 2 (00:47:39):

I can get you guys in touch down the hall. I can get you guys in touch after this episode

Speaker 3 (00:47:43):

Basically. And this goes, I do entertainment transactions. I make deals in the music industry. I come from a litigation background and I can dabble in that world, but I'm basically, I'm the relationship guy that has the relationships with the artists, the bands, the labels, and I'm connecting those dots. And I literally do the entertainment, music transactions. But the cool thing is I'm a partner at a big law firm, so I have a badass litigation department. I mean talking about varieties, top power lawyers, the best women in music on the cover of billboards. I got that right. And that's right down the hall and down the other way down the hall, I got the people that are winning massive cases for big video game companies. And I have the best immigration department, I have the best labor and employment department, I have the best trademark people, and they're all at my disposal. So when you're working with me, we can draw upon the expertise for these other people. Immigration isn't something I do, it's highly specialized thing, but I do have lots of bands that I work with that are from foreign countries who are coming here to work. And so the answer to your question is, yes, you probably need to deal with that, and I can hook you up with people that can help you. You definitely don't want to be working in the United States as a foreigner without the proper credentials.

Speaker 2 (00:49:03):

Great. Eric Burt is wondering, are there any special considerations I should take if I'm running my studio out of my home, I'll be bringing musicians in and out, and I'm wondering how can I separate my business and personal liabilities as much as possible?

Speaker 3 (00:49:18):

Oh, the easy answer to that, it's called having a corporate entity that you run things through or a loan out corporation or something like that. First of all, the studio should be potentially, again, I don't want to give you a legal advice. Every situation is different. Everything. Corporations all give you a primer on that. There are two big time reasons to incorporate or run things through a corporate entity. And number one is liability shield, and number two is tax reasons. So on the liability state, a corporation separate legal entity. So if the corporation is operating the studio and something happens and the corporation is, the studio is liable, it's the corporation that's liable, assuming you've done it correctly and you've observed proper corporate formalities and things like that, right? The second thing is you can run expenses and things like that, and there are certain tax implications to having a corporate entity, but that's one big way.

(00:50:16):

When you say, how do I separate the personal from a corporation? I don't know if you literally meant put a police line, do not cross tape across the middle of your living room just wiping kids. You are over there and we're over here. That's one way. But in terms of a legal capacity, you could do that through the use of corporate entities. The second thing that I would be thinking about is of course insurance. If you're having people come through your home and things like that, and obviously you don't want to deal with zoning issues and city work permits and things like that, running a business out of your house,

Speaker 2 (00:50:46):

Man, I got a $1 million general liability on my home when I was running the studio there. Plus an umbrella for another, an umbrella that would cover 2.5 more and another $50,000 in supplemental accident insurance for the gear.

Speaker 3 (00:51:09):

Well, there you go. You're talking to someone who's done this before and they know nobody wants to be responsible for other people's safety and stuff. When you're renting a business in your house, there's a whole set of issues that arise, including whether you're literally able to run a business in your house, clothing to the zoning law.

Speaker 2 (00:51:30):

Yeah, I wouldn't skimp on it. I would get as protected as possible because you don't know what that day that the drummer decides that he's going to hang from the ceiling and the ceiling tile that's holding him up breaks, and he hits the floor face first and breaks his neck, and that's on you. He is at your place of business.

Speaker 3 (00:51:51):

And then I'll be the first to tell you that there are a lot of scumbag lawyers out there and there's clearly going to be some guy that's going to claim that that drummer was the next Neil per. And boy, his future income was going to be a whole lot of money and we're responsible for it.

Speaker 2 (00:52:05):

So you want to be protected. You definitely want to be protected. So Paul Gorman is asking, when bands talk about being fucked by a label, vaguely, what are some of those issues you face with your musicians? Like bands not getting enough royalties, and what steps can you take to protect yourself from label issues?

Speaker 3 (00:52:27):

I see it's so funny. A lot of people come into the situation. Labels have been vilified in part because some of the work that I did on the litigation points for years and years and years, it's this idea that the label's your enemy. I see the label as a valuable business partner made partner, someone that can facilitate a lot of these things. And so you can get fucked by anybody. You can get fucked by a label, you can get fucked by a lawyer, you can get fucked by a manager. You can get fucked by your bandaid. But at the end of the day, in terms of specific issues relating to either producers and labels or bands and labels, record labels are in charge and they get their money from primarily from the exploitation of recorded music. And yet they're still to this day, even though recorded music is so depressed in terms of the economic realities of what could be realized from master recordings to this day, these labels are still responsible primarily for breaking the band in terms of promotion and marketing and funding radio campaigns and things like that.

(00:53:29):

So there's a lot of pressure on these people. And I think probably the biggest thing you say, oh, are they getting crappy royalties? It sounds like that kind of question comes from a misunderstanding of how the economics work. So number one, you want to understand going into the deal, you see a theme on everything I talk about here. Want to understand what you're getting into, what the deal is, how you get paid. And if you're working with me, I'm going to walk you through. I'm going to tell you, you make 10 bucks. Here's how it all breaks down into this deal. And if we can get the royalty up here, here's how that will implicate that. And at the same time, the thing that I think is the most common dispute is it arises more from the creative. I think when people understand each other, they move into the deal and they all kind of think we all, okay, we're going to go make a record and how much we're going to spend and we're going to hire IL as the producer, and we're going to, we're off to the races.

(00:54:25):

You get this much tour sport and this much for a video and everybody understands they're all happy and boom. And guess what? It doesn't work. Most of them don't. Most of them don't. The entertainment business is built on a model of throw tenant against the wall and hope two of them work. And those two work so well that it finances the eight that failed. And that's my business too and everything else. So a lot of people who are smart and see on in their business, they operate like a stock portfolio. You've got a couple high risk, high reward. You've got some solid earn, you've got some that aren't working so well, and you cut bait and you move things in and out out of that portfolio. And hopefully in the aggregate you're making money. But here's what happens. You this you band, this is your most important thing. This is your life and your career, and you get in there and people don't react right away. And a lot of bands, sometimes bands are right that labels fuck them because they move off it too quick. They don't stick with it, they don't give it the time of day. They make some poor decisions, the record doesn't connect, it doesn't make the money they want. And they cut bait. And when I say cut bait, it doesn't mean drop you. It means effectively cut bait. It means stop spending. It means stop shooting for the stars,

Speaker 2 (00:55:40):

Redeploy assets to another priority

Speaker 3 (00:55:43):

Hot thing that just came through. That's where the real tension starts because you think that you are great and that everything you did, and it's their fault that they didn't deploy those assets correctly. They think, Hey man, this is a business and I understand it's important for you, but I'm on to the next one. But you're stuck there. And so you need that money because Motley Crew wants to take you out on tour in Europe, they don't want to spend it. And you're like, by the way, mot La Cruz is gone, but Guns N Roses is going to take you to South America and you only need all the plane tickets to get there. And the label says, we sold 4,210 records, and I don't know if anyone going in Argentina to see you play at six o'clock on a stadium tour is really going to really care about your records.

(00:56:31):

No. And you're going to go, oh my God, I had a chance to America, this label won't pay for me. Right. That's where the problems arise. Right? How about the problem where they want you, your recording budget is X, and they want you to go in with some guy you've never heard of and you want to pay Y, and you want to hire Al because he's your boy and you listen to this podcast, you know he's great and they won't do it. And you say, why not? That's all I need. I could have Al for this record, I'd be this. How do you avoid those things? Sadly, relationships, communication, monitoring, expectations and success I guess

Speaker 2 (00:57:11):

I've got

Speaker 3 (00:57:12):

Is gone. Yeah, go.

Speaker 2 (00:57:13):

My first year touring with doth, so our first tour was right when Job for Cowboy was blowing up, so it was US job for Cowboy and Acacia Strain, and it was sold out everywhere. And then we went to Europe with Job for Cowboy in April and on Earth. Then we came back, and then we did US Oz Fest that year and Summer Slaughter as well, back to back. And then we got offered DMU Borg Gear, Amarth Europe, first of three,

Speaker 3 (00:57:48):

Killer Tour,

Speaker 2 (00:57:49):

Right? Amarth, dmu, Borg, Guko, headliner, and we would be first of three. That's it. Roadrunner turned us down because of the tour support.

Speaker 3 (00:57:59):

Right? And how much did that crush you and piss you off that one of the worst people on the planet and they're ruining your career?

Speaker 2 (00:58:05):

Dude, I broke lots of bottles that night. I was so bummed out.

Speaker 3 (00:58:12):

What you didn't take into account was the fact that they are not the worst people in the world and they didn't ruin their career. In fact, they spent a ton of money to get you that point where you were even in a position to take that.

Speaker 2 (00:58:21):

Yeah, no, I realize that at the time I realized that within 15 minutes of chilling out,

Speaker 3 (00:58:27):

And by the way, do you think that if you're at label X and label X doesn't want to pay for you to do Y or Z, and it's not in the contract that they have to, and the manager doesn't have the leverage to kind of force them to relationship wise, do you think screaming and talking crap about your label in the press, yelling at the president and shooting off crazed all caps emails at three in the morning is going to get you that money?

Speaker 2 (00:58:55):

Of course not. Never did that. By the way.

Speaker 3 (00:58:58):

I've been telling, I have one particular artist right now that's in a situation where they're not too happy or they're wondering what their situation is and they want to fight. They want to fight for their career. I'm telling them it's like you're in when you're in a contract and the label doesn't want to let you go because they know they could just put out the record, not promote it very much. Make X because there's a built-in fan base and the deal's not that expensive and you want them to go for it. You want them to spend tons of money on an active rock radio campaign and they just don't want to. Or you want that tour support and they don't want to spend it and you are trying to fight. I tell people, it's like you're in the handcuffs. The cops got you. You're in cuffs, you're sitting in the back of the car, right At this point, what are you do?

(00:59:41):

Are you going to spit on a cop? You going to kick you going to fight? You scream. Tell him the tell me. How is that going to help your situation? It's not going to help your situation. It's going to make it worse. What you got to do at that point is go, I get it. I understand. Okay. And then go talk to your team about what your strategy is for how you either change the state of affairs in terms of your success and convince the label that you are worth spending more money on or you get out and how do you get out? You talk to a lawyer, you talk to a manager, and you talk about what your options are. Sometimes your options aren't many for the moment. You need to write out this record cycle and realize that you're just not going to get what you want. And I'm sorry, that's the cold hard reality sometimes. So how do you prevent yourself from getting fucked by a label? Good team, good relationships and success when it starts to turn sour, try to handle it maturely.

Speaker 2 (01:00:39):

And let me also just add that I don't think Roadrunner were fucking us by not giving us the tour support. I mean, they had their reasons. They had dumped hundreds of thousands into us and maybe our record sales weren't strong enough to justify that extra tour support for me as a band member, it would've been, fuck yeah, Oz and then dgi Marth. Fuck yeah, bro. But maybe the numbers didn't add up and that doesn't mean they were fucking us over. That just means they're being smart business people.

Speaker 3 (01:01:15):

I am not only, and I'm not aware of that specific details of that situation, but I would say this, it's not only that maybe the numbers didn't add up, of course they didn't add up because these people are professionals. You've done this once with your band for the most part. They do it every day. They do 40 bands a year. They have a pretty good sense of how much extra you're going to sell from that. D Mor Bo here, Ammar Tour in Europe, and they have a pretty good, and they're in the business of selling records. So they look at it and think about this, if you need $40,000 to go to Europe, how many records do you have to sell in addition based on that tour to have made that made sense, right? Think about it, it's a lot. And so maybe it's just not adding up.

(01:02:00):

And I'm sure if it was adding up, I'm sure there's a very few situations where it's a super close call and it's right on the line. But remember people a lot of times this is about math and it's simply you're going to play in front of this many people a night, and it's our experience that this will move the needle this much. But the cost to get there is this. And that's where I guess label and band interests don't always align because you want to build your touring history, you want to get your guarantees up. You have other ways to make money from merch, from guarantees, fan clubs meet and greet VIP, and they don't. Maybe sometimes they do participate to some extent, but for the most part, that's your money. So it's more an interest sometimes to have some of these profiling opportunities that don't necessarily benefit the label, but yet you're asking the label to pay for that.

Speaker 2 (01:02:48):

Yeah, exactly. So here's one from Nikolai, Michael Wallace. Where can bands go to find an entertainment lawyer to work with? Maybe I'm wrong, but I get the impression that the legal world is just as rife with shady people looking to make a quick buck. So how can we tell the good guys from the bad ones without just going straight to who charges the most?

Speaker 3 (01:03:13):

Well, there's a clear answer to that, and that answer is undoubtedly ask your friend, right? And I say this once before to someone, if you are so disconnected from the music business that you don't have someone who's worked with someone who's friends with someone, you're probably not at the point where you need a lawyer yet. In other words, somebody knows. Somebody knows somebody, especially on the internet, not too hard to find my name on the internet and dozens of others who are as good or better as I am to do what I do. So I don't think it should be too hard. It's just like anything else. How do you find an auto mechanic? How do you find a doctor? How do you find a dentist? How do you find probably someone who's already had a good experience? You can go online, you can talk to people and see who makes sense.

(01:04:02):

Who are you involved with, who gets you, who understands you in terms of motivating for me, what am I looking for to take someone on? I'm either looking to get paid, I'm looking to build a relationship, or I'm looking to, I'm so personally passionate about it that I just have to do it like I give money to the opera or the symphony because I think those things need to exist, not because it's a sound business transaction for me, but so some things I just do just because this is just rad. It just has to be there. Some things I say, well, this isn't my personal favorite, but that manager's really important and he pays me in other ways. So I got to do that. And then sometimes I'm looking to get paid, but I promise that everyone's got their own reasons why they take things on. But it's easy enough to find these people. Ask Al, ask some of the guests that have been on IL's show, or ask the guy that recorded your record or ask your other band or ask the manager, ask the guy that runs a local club or ask the sound guy from the national band that just came through town. Somebody knows somebody.

Speaker 2 (01:05:11):

Yeah, they're out there. Alright, so final question. This is from Adam Scholarly, which is my band is starting to get enough of a following that we've started touring regionally in doing so, especially when going somewhere for the first time. We occasionally run across the venue slash promoter that takes the money and runs or just flat out refuses to pay us despite the contract we had and the fact that we did everything we were supposed to when this happened locally, there was little we could really do since it would've said just spread the word and would make people refuse to work with us again. But when this happens out on tour, when the pay was going to be our gas and hotel and whatever money, this becomes a bigger issue beyond a contract. What are the other legal protections we can put in place to make sure the other party upholds their end of the bargain?

Speaker 3 (01:06:05):

Call the police in a crowbar. No, I'm just kidding. You ever see that and V movie? You guys seen that? I haven't. The story of Ville. Oh, you got to see that. It's pretty funny. But there's a point where they're touring Europe and they show up at the club and the guy doesn't want to pay 'em. And it's just like, this is what I'm picturing, I'm listening. But if it's not, unfortunately guys, if it's not a lot of money, there's not a lot you can do because again, it's cost benefit, risk reward, right? Going out and paying someone to help you or going to the courts. Even small claims court, which is probably the right answer here. And I believe in most places small claims is anything under $5,000, something like that. But yes, you struck beyond those things or there's usually a cost in terms of your own time and energy put into fighting something.

(01:06:57):

How are you going to resolve the situation right there that night in order to get you the food and the burritos and the gas money to get to the next town? Gee, I don't know, man. Maybe get paid upfront. Maybe make sure you have strong relationships. Maybe you don't put yourself in a position where you're absolutely screwed if somebody doesn't pay you and you don't know the person that well and things aren't clear enough that maybe have a strong manager, maybe have a strong booking agent, I guess is probably a really good answer that the booking agent usually would have these types of relationships. A lot of times at bigger shows, booking agent gets deposits and things like that.

Speaker 2 (01:07:33):

I hate to say, and don't be afraid to be intimidating.

Speaker 3 (01:07:37):

I'm not going to advocate on a public podcast resulting resorting to other means. But I will say that I think that really one of the things that was mentioned by the question itself was the idea of the internet is a real powerful thing, man. If somebody, your name is your brand, and if I was ripping people off and then all of a sudden the internet was flooded with accusations, that would suck for me. So I think the same thing goes for il. The same thing goes for any club owner, any band I've seen real, real quick stuff. Go super, super south for people in the course of a few hours by someone posting on the internet that someone did something and remember defamation liable and slander. You can't be spreading untruth that harm people that you know to be untrue. But if literally, and there's two sides to every story.

(01:08:41):

If someone so brazenly owes you money or refuse to give it to you, I would expect and hope there's some kind of explanation for why, but sort of that you're spreading that information and tipping people off to the fact that this person is doing that. It's probably pretty powerful and probably the most powerful tool you have. And I imagine that if you're getting held up like that, you're probably not that big. You're not that powerful of a band, and so therefore the money's probably not that much and so therefore that's probably about all you can do,

Speaker 2 (01:09:13):

Bitch

Speaker 3 (01:09:14):

About it.

Speaker 2 (01:09:15):

So I was lying. I actually have one more question. It's a good one. Shoot. Okay, here's one from Marty Williamson. Here's a question I'd love to hear an answer for. Back in 2009, my then current band signed a record deal with Crash Music Incorporated originally called Pavement, then Crash now back to Pavement. We paid for the album studio, time mixing, mastering, et cetera. The album was released, which had dismal promotional airport, and we were told that we would get regular statements and we would receive 50% royalties because we paid for the album to be made. We never saw a penny nor a statement. The label had a deal with EMI for distro and other purposes, and now still years later, if I upload any of the music to the net, I get warnings and legal actions about copyright infringement. I've often pondered pursuing some legal action, but then I realized that we're just a small nothing band from nowhere us. So I figured that and the non-existent promotion, it probably wouldn't be worth it. What I'd like to know is does this happen regularly to bands and what exactly do you think was going on behind the scenes? This crap haunts me to this day. Sorry, I know it's not mix related, but thought I'd take a stab at getting some answers.

Speaker 3 (01:10:41):

Well, I mean, you said it yourself, it's probably not worth, you got to look forward, don't look in the rear view mirror, but I understand your creativity as your art. It's your baby. And if this is very, very important to you, you got to cost benefit analysis again and figure out how important it really is to you. And if it's important enough that it's worth hiring a professional that has the right contacts and looking into it, maybe you should do so. But I don't know the specifics of this situation. I do know that in the music business, sometimes corporations, things move around. People sell, companies move, companies move away from distributors and things tend to, especially things that aren't really that economically popping off get lost in the shuffle from time to time there. And sometimes it does take a bit of a cure to sort it all out.

(01:11:30):

And it could be as simple as somebody doesn't realize how to get in touch with someone else or someone's moved or they don't know where to send a statement or the company was bought and who knows, right? But it sounds like a mess. It sounds like a chore to get involved with, but it could be done. It probably is not something without the realm of possibility that you could hire someone to help you look into this and take care of it. But I would start, of course, with the people you did business with in the first place, and are you in touch with them? So there's a lot of questions that I guess would be better addressed in private

Speaker 2 (01:12:05):

Sounds like. It sounds like this is one of those onions that you just keep peeling back more and more layers from.

Speaker 3 (01:12:14):

I can tell you, I know so many musicians, guys in bands, guys that had success at one point or something, and you'll be out at a party or at an event or the show at a bar and they'll come up to me and they'll say, Hey dude, when I remember the song, I know their success or I know what that was and there's always some lingering, this guy didn't pay me this, that, or I never got royalties, or I never saw a statement for this. And nine times out of 10 I'm saying, yo, man, I feel your pain. It's going to take me 15 hours and you don't want to know how much I charge an hour. It's probably more than you ever made off this thing. So let me send you to some of my less experienced friends. But this is one of those situations where it just takes someone being able to figure out who they need to be talking to and to get that person on the phone. Generally, my experience that companies are not in the business of ripping off young, struggling musicians that for the most part, with some exceptions that you read about sometimes on the internet and stuff, for the most part, no one's that brazen, they don't care. It's probably not, you just said you're young, struggling bands, there's probably not that much money that's worth stealing from somebody. So it's just probably some confusion.

Speaker 2 (01:13:29):

Yeah, it's probably someone's disorganized and didn't even realize that they owed the money.

Speaker 3 (01:13:36):

A lot of labels, I mean people don't even know what they own extensive catalogs that have been transferred around for years. And mind you, there are some classic records. I ask some of what you probably know of them that are lost in, there was a time in my youth where a lot of these metal bands were on major labels. So there's a lot of talk from time to time about, remember that record that was on blank? That major label X still owns it. They don't care about it, they don't exploit it, so it never comes out. Nobody does anything with it. I'd like to get it from them, but they want an obscene amount of money. Look at their statement. They'll say, well, we're $200,000 on reup, so you can buy it for 200,000 bucks. Somebody wants to do some little indie release that's worth 10 grand. It doesn't happen and it's not worth the time for the label to do that indie release. They're not, their current promotions and marketing team isn't going to put this out. So it's just languish. It's unfortunate,

Speaker 2 (01:14:32):

But it happens. It definitely happens. Eric, thank you so much for taking time out of your trip to talk to me and to talk to our audience and to share so openly with us. Thank

Speaker 3 (01:14:45):

You. I really appreciate it. I really enjoy the podcast. I really

Speaker 2 (01:14:48):

Believe

Speaker 3 (01:14:49):

In what you're doing. And I would say that I look forward to hopefully a real cool tribute to Chris Cornell at Rocking The Range this weekend and seeing my favorite band, Metallica, rocking out in the pit with all my bros not worrying about contracts or royalties or anything, just pumping my fist in the air and yelling Master Master at the top of my lungs. Right.

Speaker 2 (01:15:12):

That sounds great.

Speaker 3 (01:15:14):

Be good, Al. Thank you so

Speaker 2 (01:15:15):

Much. Have a good one, man. Have a good one.

Speaker 1 (01:15:18):

Thank you. The Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast is brought to you by two notes. Audio Engineering two Notes is a leader in the market for roadblocks Cabinet and Mike Simulators. Gone are the days of having iso rooms or having to record an amp at ear bleeding volumes to capture that magic tone, the Torpedo Live reload and studio allow you to crank your amp up as loud as you want, but record silently. Check out www.two-notes.com for more info. To ask us questions, make suggestions and interact. Visit nail the mix.com/podcast and subscribe today.