Nine artists are claiming UMG is holding masters "hostage."

[BUtterfield 8 41,506]

I can’t find any other links but this is behind a paywall unfortunately 

 

[Teletubby 150,569]

the lawsuits:
https://www.scribd.com/document/570458857/Waite-v-UMG

“termination right” -  is supposed to let artists take back control of their old music, but the lawsuit says UMG has  ignored the obligation when it comes to masters.

A nearly-identical case was filed against Sony Music Entertainment, claiming it had adopted a similar stance on terminations.

According to the lawsuits, the labels have long claimed that most sound recordings – unlike the underlying musical composition – aren’t subject to the termination rule. The basic argument is that most recordings are so-called works for hire, meaning the label essentially creates them itself and simply hires artists to contribute to them.

[moonsago 7,285]

Music labels are SCAMS overall. It’s still crazy to me how essentially artists are the ones that have to pay for EVERYTHING yet the labels still gets a huge cut out their check. So they don’t invest anything in the end because the artist has to pay them back for everything. It’s not an equal investment and the profit is split, you have to give them profit and pay them back for their investment. So it’s like taking a loan. SCAMMY if you ask me. 

[River 117,654]

so who are the artists?

[LilyLark 10,108]

49 minutes ago, moonsago said:

Music labels are SCAMS overall. It’s still crazy to me how essentially artists are the ones that have to pay for EVERYTHING yet the labels still gets a huge cut out their check. So they don’t invest anything in the end because the artist has to pay them back for everything. It’s not an equal investment and the profit is split, you have to give them profit and pay them back for their investment. So it’s like taking a loan. SCAMMY if you ask me. 

Yup. Like I'm not going to pretend that artists aren't filthy rich, but musicians can still be very wealthy and yet subject to unfair labor practices (as in labels screw them over). Streaming services and LiveNation/Ticketmaster are even worse....I wish I could remember which band it was, but they were probably "B" level, and they made only around 15k (USD) a year from Spotify. I'm not surprised UMG is screwing artists over in regards to their masters.

*The worst example I can think of is that a lot of artists have to pour money into their own tours-even if the label is supposed to cover it all-and tours are crazy expensive. It's also why fans should stop being so judgey towards artists who hawk for Apple, Pepsi, Coke, fashion labels, cosmetics labels, etc. (not just Gaga, but  Billie, Taylor, Selena, Twigs, etc.)...a) fans aren't obligated to buy it and b) musicians have insanely high overhead due to the costs they have to partially cover themselves (not to mention security, etc.)

[salty like sodium 1,923]

1 hour ago, moonsago said:

Music labels are SCAMS overall. It’s still crazy to me how essentially artists are the ones that have to pay for EVERYTHING yet the labels still gets a huge cut out their check. So they don’t invest anything in the end because the artist has to pay them back for everything. It’s not an equal investment and the profit is split, you have to give them profit and pay them back for their investment. So it’s like taking a loan. SCAMMY if you ask me. 

I mean banks pretty much work the same way, so do loans for houses and education... Music labels are basically just banks. The only difference is a lot of music artists earn a lot more even after those fees are taken out than most people taking out a bank loan. Not planning on crying for them anytime soon 

[moonsago 7,285]

1 hour ago, salty like sodium said:

I mean banks pretty much work the same way, so do loans for houses and education... Music labels are basically just banks. The only difference is a lot of music artists earn a lot more even after those fees are taken out than most people taking out a bank loan. Not planning on crying for them anytime soon 

It’s not the same thing... it was TLC I believe who said that one of their projects ( an album? ) made the record label 100 million dollars while they each walked away with around 300k. So while it’s similar to a bank loan, it’s still not because the money these labels walk away with is ridiculous in comparison to the artist who does most the work, the bank doesn’t make such astronomical profits from a loan. The labels have the funding and the contacts and take care of the ‘promo’ whatever that means.... But all the promo in the world doesn’t justify them walking away with 99 million dollars while the artist gets bellow 1 percent after they pay back the said ‘loan’, does it? So I understand that artists are rich and it’s hard to be sorry for them but when you put it into perspective, they can get scammed as well and it’s still not okay. I believe Megan Thee Stalion sued her label as well last year for making close to nothing from her music... 

[AsleepOnTheCeiling 6,423]

51 minutes ago, moonsago said:

It’s not the same thing... it was TLC I believe who said that one of their projects ( an album? ) made the record label 100 million dollars while they each walked away with around 300k. So while it’s similar to a bank loan, it’s still not because the money these labels walk away with is ridiculous in comparison to the artist who does most the work, the bank doesn’t make such astronomical profits from a loan. The labels have the funding and the contacts and take care of the ‘promo’ whatever that means.... But all the promo in the world doesn’t justify them walking away with 99 million dollars while the artist gets bellow 1 percent after they pay back the said ‘loan’, does it? So I understand that artists are rich and it’s hard to be sorry for them but when you put it into perspective, they can get scammed as well and it’s still not okay. I believe Megan Thee Stalion sued her label as well last year for making close to nothing from her music... 

There's no point in arguing with people like them. Some people will always hate on the success of artists, despite being on a Stan page. 

[RAMROD 109,857]

By the way the artist in question are;

John Waite, Joe Ely, 

Steven Wynn, Dennis Mehaffey and David Pellish, (who together performed as the band The Dream Syndicate), 

and no mention about the rest.

 

Found the names after looking up the internet. Not familiar with the name? Me neither   But after quick search they seems to be one hit wonder & hasbeen from 70s and 80s

[AkariGaga 1,134]

47 minutes ago, RAMROD said:

By the way the artist in question are;

John Waite, Joe Ely, 

Steven Wynn, Dennis Mehaffey and David Pellish, (who together performed as the band The Dream Syndicate), 

and no mention about the rest.

 

Found the names after looking up the internet. Not familiar with the name? Me neither   But after quick search they seems to be one hit wonder & hasbeen from 70s and 80s

One hit wonder or not really doesn’t matter in this situation.We have seen big big  artists like Taylor Swift getting screwed by their labels.So there are more reasons to believe smaller artists and artists with no name are getting screwed really bad by their labels.

[RAMROD 109,857]

31 minutes ago, AkariGaga said:

One hit wonder or not really doesn’t matter in this situation.We have seen big big  artists like Taylor Swift getting screwed by their labels.So there are more reasons to believe smaller artists and artists with no name are getting screwed really bad by their labels.

It matter cos they will really need those royalty money for their one hit that people keep spinning cos that is probably  their only meal tickets.

Big artists who have multiple mansions  all over the countries, can care more about the law side of it, but that is not as easy for people like these guys. If they wanna take control of their full royalty then they will fight for it. Which making this case even more important for their livelihood. 

[salty like sodium 1,923]

On 4/19/2022 at 2:54 AM, moonsago said:

It’s not the same thing... it was TLC I believe who said that one of their projects ( an album? ) made the record label 100 million dollars while they each walked away with around 300k. So while it’s similar to a bank loan, it’s still not because the money these labels walk away with is ridiculous in comparison to the artist who does most the work, the bank doesn’t make such astronomical profits from a loan. The labels have the funding and the contacts and take care of the ‘promo’ whatever that means.... But all the promo in the world doesn’t justify them walking away with 99 million dollars while the artist gets bellow 1 percent after they pay back the said ‘loan’, does it? So I understand that artists are rich and it’s hard to be sorry for them but when you put it into perspective, they can get scammed as well and it’s still not okay. I believe Megan Thee Stalion sued her label as well last year for making close to nothing from her music... 

i definitely get that but i also have a student loan that has so much interest i'm probably going to end up paying 90% interest by the time i can afford to pay it off, and this is how 90% of students in the UK are forced to fund their studies.  And for the most part we basically don't even go into a classroom so we literally pay 50 grand + 5% yearly compound interest for a piece of paper. I'd rather the 300k from getting the record label's contacts, exposure etc. instead.