Comments on: Epidemic Sound

By: Denis Woods

Denis Woods — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 00:38:20 +0000

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By: Damph

Damph — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 00:26:46 +0000

ASCAP has a non-exclusive membership model. When you sign with them, you still retain all the rights over your music, and can license them directly to anyone you need. All the other PRO's in the world have an exclusive model - once you sign with them, you no longer have the right to license the performing rights in your music directly to anyone else. What Epidemic Sound seem to be doing is trying to create a revenue stream for those musicians who aren't members of PROs, or aren't happy with their PRO's performance. There are plenty of those. After all, how much money do most musicians really see from performing rights? I'm sure there are plenty of people who'd rather have a single upfront payment than rely on possible future royalties that may not ever emerge. This could also be good as a way to chip away at the monopoly most PROs have in their countries. And it's always good to have more business models - at least it provides options for those musicians who aren't doing well under the old system. If you're someone who does turn out work very quickly, has an interest in production music, and has difficulty getting much interest in your work from the mainstream industry, this could be a good option. But I agree with the devil's in the detail comment. Whether this is a good idea will depend on exactly what their contract says, whether their payments seem fair for the rights their asking etc. And it will depend on you, the kind of musician you are, what business models you use, and what models will be of benefit to you.

By: Denis Woods

Denis Woods — Wed, 27 Oct 2010 19:23:20 +0000

@Round charlie Do you know this as a fact ? or are you just surmising this. By what has been posted these two individuals (a generous term) pay writers pathetic amounts for buyouts for tracks, what they then do with them then I have no idea, Do you have a connection with this crew?

By: Round Charlie

Round Charlie — Wed, 27 Oct 2010 08:59:12 +0000

This is all about the broadcasters. They are all looking to cut costs, and more specifically, reduce the amounts they pay annually to PROs. Sky in the Uk or the other cable/satellite stations pay considerable amounts to use library and commercial music. If someone like Sky takes out a license with someone like Epidemic, it means they can negotiate a lower TV blanket fee with the PRO and save costs. Lets say Sky pay £5m to the MCPS or PRS, and can shave off £2m by using non registered music, and then only pay £200k to Epidemic, thats a considerable saving in the short term. It does leave the broadcaster with very little in the way of creative choice, but do they really care about that? The Business Affairs people who do the sums certainly don't.

By: dblock

dblock — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 03:01:02 +0000

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By: Tim Williamson

Tim Williamson — Thu, 30 Sep 2010 21:08:53 +0000

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By: Denis W

Denis W — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 19:59:53 +0000

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By: Johan

Johan — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 19:18:45 +0000

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By: Denis W

Denis W — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 17:28:16 +0000

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By: Johan

Johan — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 04:15:41 +0000

I worked for Epidemic Sound for a while, but quit because they paid me about 80 USD per song excluding VAT, The contract I signed gave them the lifetime copyright of my songs (But yay, I still owned the nonprofit copyrights). In order to have the music as my profession I had to record, produce and mix/master 3 (by them approved) songs per day. I never managed to keep that tempo, but if I did, I would have the same salary as a Burger King employee (In Sweden)..