DailyDirt: Imagine All The People, Sharing All The World...

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

The Beatles broke up by 1970, but since then, they've still managed to release a few new songs, like Free As A Bird and Real Love.. and even the new music video for Words Of Love (released this year). Maybe it's a bit creepy to hear new songs coming from a band that hasn't existed in decades, but at least these guys were real people (and not some computer-generated pop stars). Imagine how much more music with the Beatles would be available if mashups of their songs weren't considered copyright infringement? Beyond the infamous Grey Album, check out some of these creative Beatles mashups.

• Ever wonder what a hundred vinyl record players would sound like if they were playing the Beatles White Album's side 1 at (almost) the same time? Wonder no more. Check it out before the copyright bot on SoundCloud deletes it.... [url]
• If you don't have the time to listen to every Beatles song sequentially, how about listening to them all at once (it only takes about 8 minutes)? Note: you can buy this track for the bargain price of $1 per Beatles song ($226) as a John-Cage-esque mashup (8 minutes 22 seconds of silence). [url]
• Paul McCartney can still collaborate with John Lennon with a mashup like Imagine The Band -- a combination of Imagine and Band on the Run. Apparently, Lennon can also play with Coldplay and other bands, too. [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.

Filed Under: beatles, coldplay, grey album, john cage, mashups, music, pop star, white album
Companies: bandcamp, soundcloud

Unauthorized Remix Improves On Landmark Unauthorized Mashup, The Grey Album

from the look-how-culture-works dept

This is a story of massive infringement upon infringement. Or it's a story about culture and building awesome things from the building blocks others helped put together. Or both -- which really should say something about copyright laws today. It was nearly nine years ago that EMI went completely off the rails in trying to threaten everyone for The Grey Album -- the first truly popular mashup album. Put together by the producer Danger Mouse, The Grey Album used Jay-Z's vocals from The Black Album and mashed them up with music samples entirely from the Beatles The White Album -- and it actually worked.

Jay-Z has since referred to it as "genius" and expressed how honored he was to see it happen. EMI, which controlled the Beatles' rights, felt differently, sending cease-and-desist letters to tons of sites that had the mp3s. In response, folks on the internet planned Grey Tuesday for February 24th, 2004 -- a day of digital civil disobedience, where lots of sites would distribute the mashup album. EMI, still not understanding what it was dealing with, sent off more cease-and-desist letters to any site that had indicated that it would participate. End result? Even more interest in the whole thing.

Of course, since then, Danger Mouse has gone on to be an in-demand guy in the recording industry (among other things, he's one-half of Gnarls Barkley, who of course had a massive hit with the song "Crazy" a few years ago). EMI later admitted that The Grey Album didn't "harm" them at all, but still defended the decision arguing, pointlessly, "it's not a question of damage, it's a question of rights."

Given all that, one has to wonder what EMI thinks of another top industry guy, recording engineer John Stewart (who's worked with Kanye West, Big Boi and John Legend), who has remastered the audio on The Grey Album, arguing that he could do a better job -- and the early reviews seem to agree. As noted in the Forbes article linked above:

Revisiting The Grey Album with an expert ear gave Stewart the ability to pinpoint its audio flaws, and his professional experience gave him the agency to do something about it. Stewart says he first got the idea to remaster The Grey Album on Wednesday, Nov. 21, but it didn’t really click until that Saturday. On Sunday he set out to improve the album’s audio, tinkering with various faders in ProTools until he achieved the desired effect: “I just kind of put the sonics on steroids,” he says.

He then put the whole thing up on SoundCloud and Mediafire, where it's getting plenty of listens and downloads. But, of course, as Slate points out: this is still an "unauthorized" work. And even though there's almost certainly no "harm," has EMI (now owned by Universal) finally understood that it makes sense to let these things go?

Filed Under: culture, grey album, remix, unauthorized

Disappointing: Famed Copyright Rogue Danger Mouse Sues Home Depot And Pizza Hut... Over Copyright

from the glass-houses dept

Regular Techdirt readers, as well as fans of hip-hop and/or Gnarls Barkley, will be familiar with Danger Mouse, the highly respected producer who operates well outside of copyright law. He's perhaps most famous for The Grey Album—a mashup of Jay-Z and The Beatles (praised by the original artists) that sparked EMI to go on a copyright rampage, in turn leading to the Grey Tuesday movement that made the album one of the most popular bootlegs ever, until EMI eventually gave up. Later, he released an album to stores as a blank CD-R with artwork and liner notes while hinting that fans should find the music itself "by whatever means", since he knew there was no way he could legally sell it. Danger Mouse is one of the perfect examples of how copyright is interfering with culture and creativity in very real ways, contrary to its supposed goals.

So it's surprising, and very disappointing, to learn that Danger Mouse and The Black Keys are suing over the unauthorized use of their music in commercials:

The Black Keys sued Home Depot Inc. (HD) and Yum Brands Inc. (YUM)’s Pizza Hut, alleging the companies used the rock duo’s songs in commercials without authorization.

Patrick Carney and Daniel Auerbach, known as the Black Keys, sued Home Depot for the unauthorized use of “Lonely Boy,” and sued Pizza Hut and its advertising company, Interpublic Group of Cos., over “Gold on the Ceiling,” in separate filings yesterday in federal court in Los Angeles. The group said Pizza Hut and its ad agency created a commercial for a product called Cheesy Bites Pizza that “prominently features significant portions” of “Gold on the Ceiling.” Home Depot ran a commercial for its Ryobi brand of power tools that uses parts of “Lonely Boy,” the band said.

...

Also suing the companies is co-writer Brian Burton, known professionally as Danger Mouse. The plaintiffs asked for jury trials of the copyright-infringement suits.

Now, obviously there are a few key differences here. The in-depth remix work of artists like Danger Mouse has a strong transformative fair use argument that remains mostly untested in court, while the same cannot really be said for Home Depot and Pizza Hut commercials. Moreover, while it would not have been prohibitive for these big companies to seek a license, it was pretty much impossible for Danger Mouse to release his work legally. And, generally speaking, a lot of people are going to find it easier to support a person who defies copyright for the sake of art than a company that defies it for the sake of a commercial.

Nevertheless, I think this is a pretty bad move on Danger Mouse's part, and an unimpressive one. He's likely to face a lot more copyright issues in his career—as are artists he's inspired with his incredibly popular, but often infringing, work—and he'd be in a much better position to fight them if he could show that he never went after anyone with his own copyrights. There are much better ways to deal with a situation like this. It's the sort of thing the internet pays attention to, and if he had simply been open, human and awesome in informing people about what happened, it's likely that his supporters would have mobilized, and pretty soon the companies would be banging down his door in the hopes of reaching an agreement and shaking hands in public. Hell, he probably could have remixed the commercials and made something infinitely cooler, spreading his message that way and making the companies look silly. By going the legal route, he comes off as somewhat hypocritical, despite the differences between the situations.

A lot of people think, because we generally oppose the aggressive enforcement of copyright here at Techdirt, that we think any and all copying should run rampant. But that's not true. If someone is being genuinely "exploited" (a favorite term of copyright maximalists), then there are ways to address that—and the best one is by letting the public decide. Social pressure is an incredibly powerful thing, and employing it before running to the courts allows these situations to be resolved in much more natural ways that actually reflect the development of our shared, public culture. Sure, sometimes you run up against an intransigent Charles Carreon—but even then, you can apparently raise a bunch of money for charity and come out on top in the court of public opinion. Meanwhile, you leave the doors open to an amicable solution—maybe even one that creates new opportunities for both parties—which is a virtual impossibility once the legal nastygrams start flying.

Filed Under: danger mouse, grey album, open human and awesome, social pressure, the black keys
Companies: home depot, pizza hut

Jay-Z Explains He Is 'Honored' To Have His Work Remixed By Others

from the creativity-by-remix dept

A Dan points us to a fascinating interview with Jay-Z on Fresh Air that's worth listening to in its entirety. However, there are a few quotes concerning copyright and sampling that are most interesting. For example, there's a discussion about the infamous Grey Album -- a mashup by DJ Danger Mouse mixing The Beatles' White Album and Jay-Z's Black Album. As you probably know, EMI went insane over this release, threatening to sue everyone -- as it has done since then on other Beatles mashups to this day. However, I can't recall ever hearing anything, one way or the other, about Jay-Z's opinion on the album, and it's basically the opposite of the way EMI/The Beatles reacted (from about 12:50 in the interview):

Terry Gross: "So I've got to ask you how you feel about the Grey Album, which is the mash-up that Danger Mouse did of your Black Album and the Beatles' White Album, without any copyright permission. So, how do you feel about it musically and how do you feel about the fact that he did it?"

Jay-Z: "I think it was a really strong album. I champion any form of creativity and that was a genius idea to do it, and it sparked so many others like it. There are other ones that, you know, it's really good, there are other ones that, because of the blueprint that was set by him, that I think are a little better. But, you know, him being the first and having the idea; I thought it was genius."

Terry Gross: "Did you feel ripped off by the fact that he used your music on it without paying for it? Or did you think it doesn’t matter, it’s really good art."

Jay-Z: "No, I was actually honored that, you know, someone took the time to mash those records up with Beatles records. I was honored to be on, you know, quote-unquote the same song with the Beatles."

If you listen to the actual audio, you can hear his sincerity on that last part. Later on (around 23:45), he talks about the process of getting permission to sample Hard Knock Life, highlighting the ridiculousness of permission culture. While he was thrilled about having others sample his music and do stuff with it, when it came to getting the rights for Hard Knock Life, he had to convince the original songwriters to let him sample it, and to do so he told "a big lie" concerning how he had seen the play, Annie, on Broadway as a kid, and had written an essay for some school essay contest about the importance of seeing Annie on Broadway. While the original songwriter of Hard Knock Life notes that he was happy with the Jay-Z song, it still highlights one of the problems with permission culture. Basically, Jay-Z had to beg (and lie) to create art.

Filed Under: copyright, danger mouse, grey album, jay-z, remix, samples

EMI Apparently Forgot Grey Album Disaster; Issues Takedown Of Wu Tang vs. Beatles

from the haven't-we-done-this-before? dept

I'm beginning to think that EMI is trying to commit suicide, given many of its recent actions. Its latest move is to force offline a wildly popular mashup, mixing The Beatles with The Wu Tang Clan., despite it getting rave reviews and lots of attention... and despite a history of similar actions backfiring massively for EMI.

Let's take a look back. Apparently the folks over at EMI/Capitol Records have no sense of history. Back in 2004, DJ Danger Mouse put together "The Grey Album," a fantastic mashup of The Beatles' "The White Album" with Jay-Z's "The Black Album." EMI/Capitol, who holds the copyright on much of The Beatles' catalog went nuts, and started sending cease-and-desists to pretty much everyone, leading to the infamous "Grey Tuesday" on February 24, 2004, where lots of websites posted the album in protest. Years later, EMI admitted that the Grey Album didn't do any harm, but the company didn't care, saying "It's not a question of damage; it's a question of rights." Except, that's not true at all. If no damage is being done -- and, in fact, such a mashup is likely to attract a lot more attention to your back catalog from an audience who might not be that familiar with it, you're making a pretty huge mistake. That's just business.

Of course, EMI/Capitol refuses to learn. A few years later, when someone put together a Beatles/Beach Boys mashup, EMI/Capitol again sent out cease-and-desists and demanded the IP addresses of anyone who downloaded the album.

And here we are today, as EMI/Capitol (who, last we saw, was trying to bootstrap a fake word of mouth viral campaign, after its suits blocked a real viral campaign) is fighting to stay alive, as it is massively in debt, with little hope of getting out of it.

So what does EMI/Capitol decide to do? The same thing that's helped fuel this downward spiral: send out cease-and-desists on wildly popular mashups.

Towards the end of January, word started spreading online of a mashup put together by Tom Caruana and Tea Side Records, called "Wu-Tang vs. The Beatles: Enter the Magical Mystery Chambers." I have to admit, I've been listening to it a lot the last few weeks, and it's really well done. It quickly started receiving rave reviews online. If you listen, this certainly isn't just playing Wu Tang vocals over Beatles instrumentals. As many noticed, the beats are changed significantly to fit with the vocals.

But, apparently, that's not going to satisfy EMI/Capitol. It's not entirely clear what happened, but the album has been removed from where it was originally posted, and the only explanation is a short comment on February 10th:

Had to remove all Wu Beatles material at Capitol Records request

So, yes, as EMI/Capitol are battling for survival, its lawyers thought the best thing to do with their time was to send a cease & desist to an album that might actually get them some attention and sell some Beatles albums -- and they do so knowing how badly this backfired with The Grey Album, leading many to swear off EMI releases. No wonder they're going out of business.

Filed Under: beatles, grey album, mashup, wu tang
Companies: capitol records, emi