Wendy Day breaks down ten steps independent artists need before releasing music. Register your compositions and sound recordings with the Copyright Office, get written agreements with all contributors, join ASCAP or BMI for royalties, and obtain ISRC codes and UPC barcodes. If you're covering someone else's song, you need a mechanical license from the Harry Fox Agency.
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Hey guys, so 10 things to do before you release music into the marketplace, even if you're putting it out for free. Even if you're putting it out for free, okay. There is a companion article that goes with this, um, because I don't expect you to be furiously taking notes and writing down all of the websites that I'm about to give you. So if you look below this video, um, there is a link to my blog where this article is posted that will give you everything that I'm referencing here. Okay, 10 things to do before you release music into the marketplace, even if the music is free. One, have a contractual agreement with the producer who made the beat. Not only do you need to have a split sheet with that person, but you need some sort of contractual agreement that gives you the right to license the track, and it's going to explain, um, how and where you plan to use it, how the producer is going to be paid, how long the contract is— will be in existence for. And who owns what in the song. If the producer is someone who samples, then you're going to need to clear the sample. I do not think that as a new artist you should take on that expense, um, which means not that you shouldn't clear samples, because you should. You can get sued even if you're giving it away for free. Um, I'm saying you shouldn't sample. You're a new artist, you don't have a budget. For sampling. I don't believe that you need to spend money on that. So unless it is a slam dunk hit record, um, I just don't see a reason to leave a sample in a song. Just my own personal opinion. Um, I use, uh, Deborah Manus Gardner to clear samples. It's dmgclearances.com. And you want to make sure that you not only clear the sample, but you contractually decide who's going to pay for that sample. And by pay, I don't necessarily mean the money, although that's important too. Whoever owns the original publishing on the song that you're going to use is going to want a percentage of the publishing on your new song. So does that come out of your share? Does it come out of the producer's share? Do you split it equally? These are things you have to decide contractually before you put the music out. Number 2, have a contractual agreement with every singer, every background singer, every musician, every feature that appears on your songs. At the very least, you need a split sheet that everybody agrees who owns what and that everyone signs, including the people who don't get any publishing. Meaning if you have a background singer and they're doing it for you as a favor and they're getting 0% of the publishing, then they should sign a split sheet that says they get 0% of the publishing. Because once your song blows up and starts to make money, people get selective memory. And if there is no agreement before that happens, then you're going to have to negotiate with people who are going to want more than you're willing to give them and more than they probably did on the song. So that agreement will also explain what their credit is going to be on the song, as, as in, you know, background vocals by Johnny P or whoever. So, um, have a contract with everyone that appears on your record. Number 3, everyone who contributes to a song should agree and sign off on a split sheet in the studio after recording the song. We just covered this a little a little bit, but I'm going to cover it more because it's really important. A split sheet states what percentage of the writer's share and the publisher's share each person owns. It has their name, their address, their phone number, you know, all the basics, um, all the basic information that you're going to need to put a contract together. It's also going to have the name of their publishing company and whether they're affiliated with ASCAP, BMI, or SESAC. And again, each contributor should sign this split sheet before they leave the studio, right? The money made from the song is going to be split according to the split sheet, and the split sheet is going to be used to put together the, um, contractual agreement, and it's going to be used to file the song with ASCAP, BMI, or SESAC, okay? Number 4: Every writer and producer on the song should fill out a copyright form, Form PA, and they need to register their work with the Copyright Office, which is copyright.gov. Again, links are below. Number 5: once you decide to release the song commercially or even for free, the person putting out the song and spending the money to market and promote it should fill out a copyright form SR, which stands for Sound Recording. And again, that's with the Copyright Office. This is a different form than Form PA, which is the form we discussed in the last point, number 4. This is number 5. It is the sound recording. If you're putting out your own music and you are the writer and the performer, you don't have to fill out both forms. You can just fill out Form PA— I mean, excuse me, SR. You can just fill out Form SR. Again, It's all below, copyright.gov. Number 6, you need to join a performing rights organization such as ASCAP, BMI, or SESAC as soon as you believe that your music will get played publicly. And that means like in a nightclub, at radio, or if you're performing it live. The performance rights organizations collect licensing fees from venues and from radio stations, and then they distribute that money twice a year in equal amounts based on how your music was played. Not equal to each artist, but depending on the amount of times your song was heard by people, you will get a percentage of that money. And again, that's ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC. Number 7, join soundexchange.com. SoundExchange is the company that collects the money for music that's streamed on cable, satellite, and on, um, the internet. So this is for the copyright owners of the music, and they also collect money from internet radio stations and websites that play music. That's soundexchange.com. Number 8: get an ISRC code. That's International Standard Recording Code. And you want to do that for each of your songs, and you can get that at usisrc.org. It's a code that is a unique identifier for each song, and it goes into the metadata of your song during mastering. And it is a way for, um, different platforms, distribution channels, etc., to identify a song when it appears in different formats. Okay, this is not to be confused with the UPC code, which is for point of sale. UPC code is what is scanned at a cash register for like a CD when you're purchasing it, and UPC codes are on every product. Uh, that's a UPC code. Okay, number 9, UPC codes. Where have you heard this before? If you plan to sell hard copies of your music, meaning CDs or vinyl, you're going to need a UPC code for each product. The overseeing organization, which is called GS1, supplies the numbers for the UPC codes, and then you turn those numbers into barcodes and you print them on your product, right? UPC code. Some CD manufacturers and some vinyl manufacturers will give you a barcode as part of the enticement to get you to press with them. Okay, they own that barcode. If they are lending you or giving you a barcode, it triggers to their company and their company's name. So if you want your own barcode and you have a budget, you should get your own barcode, and then you can include that barcode on the printing of all of your product. It's also used by SoundScan to track your product. That unique barcode Um, if you leave the distributor where you are currently distributed— distributing your vinyl or your CDs, technically they own that barcode, and you may have to change the printing on your vinyl packaging or your CD packaging if the barcode changes. And the barcode changing is kind of a nightmare, so it's not something you want to do. Unless you do not have a budget, in which case you do what you got to do. Okay, number 10: if you're covering a song— this is mostly for singers, right— if you cover a song, meaning it's a song you have not written yourself, you need to get a mechanical license from the Harry Fox Agency, which is now owned by SESAC. You can search for the song information at songfile.com, and then you can check out how to proceed at harryfox.com. If you know the songwriter yourself, you can negotiate a fee directly with them, or you can submit a notice of intention to obtain a compulsory license. And you get that at the Copyright Office, again copyright.gov. And you can issue it directly to the person if they are someone that you know. And I have a link down below for all of the, um, websites that I mentioned. It is— there's an accompanying blog article that I wrote to this video. So knock yourself out. You now know 10 things that you have to do before you put music into the marketplace, even if it's free. Bye, guys.
