No really, Aaron Fuchs is STILL a douche. (MCA-r)
soulmarcosa
4,296 Posts
Unbelievable. Or should I say totally predictable.
http://paidcontent.org/2012/05/08/beastie-boy-sued-for-sampling-on-day-of-death/
Beastie Boy sued for sampling on day of death
By Jeff John Roberts May. 8, 2012, 4:25pm
In a bitter coincidence, hip-hop great Adam Yauch of the Beastie Boys was hit by a copyright lawsuit on the same day he passed awayfrom cancer last week at the age of 47.
The lawsuit, which names Yauch (aka MCA) and other members of the band, concerns short sound clips from two seminal Beastie Boys albums, Paul???s Boutique and Licensed to Ill. The two albums helped introduce millions of listeners to hip-hop, a style of music that mixes clips of external music and culture into a beat-heavy brew.
The plaintiff in last week???s lawsuit is an obscure band called TufAmerica which claims the Beastie Boys illegally used samples from their work for songs like ???Shadrach,??? ???Car Thief??? and ???Hold it Now Hit It.???
At the time the albums were made, the Beastie Boys had a relatively easy time clearing the samples ??? (here???s a good Wired piece about how the process works). Since then, the process has become onerous, expensive and lawyer-heavy which has led some to suggestPaul???s Boutique would never have been made today.
After Yauch???s death, we called to honor him with better copyright laws that would make it easier to clear samples and allow musicians to use very short clips without fear of being sued.
TufAmerica???s lawsuit in many ways resembles what happens to fading tech companies like Yahoo which, rather than inventing something new, resort to suing instead.
http://paidcontent.org/2012/05/08/beastie-boy-sued-for-sampling-on-day-of-death/
Beastie Boy sued for sampling on day of death
By Jeff John Roberts May. 8, 2012, 4:25pm
In a bitter coincidence, hip-hop great Adam Yauch of the Beastie Boys was hit by a copyright lawsuit on the same day he passed awayfrom cancer last week at the age of 47.
The lawsuit, which names Yauch (aka MCA) and other members of the band, concerns short sound clips from two seminal Beastie Boys albums, Paul???s Boutique and Licensed to Ill. The two albums helped introduce millions of listeners to hip-hop, a style of music that mixes clips of external music and culture into a beat-heavy brew.
The plaintiff in last week???s lawsuit is an obscure band called TufAmerica which claims the Beastie Boys illegally used samples from their work for songs like ???Shadrach,??? ???Car Thief??? and ???Hold it Now Hit It.???
At the time the albums were made, the Beastie Boys had a relatively easy time clearing the samples ??? (here???s a good Wired piece about how the process works). Since then, the process has become onerous, expensive and lawyer-heavy which has led some to suggestPaul???s Boutique would never have been made today.
After Yauch???s death, we called to honor him with better copyright laws that would make it easier to clear samples and allow musicians to use very short clips without fear of being sued.
TufAmerica???s lawsuit in many ways resembles what happens to fading tech companies like Yahoo which, rather than inventing something new, resort to suing instead.
Comments
i second that...
wow!
The misunderstandings in this article, as well as the lawsuit:
Another plot-twist in the fast & furious developments of the case of The Beastie Boys vs. Tuf America. The Washington Post spoke today with Tony ???Big Tony??? Fisher of the DC-based go-go group Trouble Funk???named as the aggrieved party in the Tuf America suit???who apparently knew nothing about either the alleged samples or any legal action. Fisher told the post that although Tuff City???the golden era rap indie which has been reincarnated as Tuf America???was handling publishing rights for the group, he had no specific knowledge of the lawsuit filed on May 3rd:
We???ve been signed with Tuff City publishing company over 10 years and they???re pretty much going after people that have been using and abusing our stuff without our permission???
Fisher also stated that he was unaware of the untimely passing of Beasties co-founder Adam ???MCA??? Yauch the day after the lawsuit was filed (May 4th) telling the Post:
Wow, I???m sorry to hear that. We toured with the Beastie Boys and I like ???em. They???re good cats. And they really admired the band. I???m so sorry to hear that.
According to Post correspondent Chris Richards, the Beastie Boys camp was also contacted but a representative for the group was away for ???family bereavement??? and unavailable for comment.
I had questioned that too. I remember reading that some people use the three to five year rule, in that once it's past/outside that time frame, that's it, you can no longer make an attempt to sue or get a lawsuit. Yet I've also read arguments that if the music still sells in any capacity, or is used in some form, gets airplay, etc., then some feel it's still valid to pursue.
I believe that's exactly what this case is about too. Capitol had pressed up a lot of copies of Paul's Boutique in the summer of 1989 with expectations of equaling or perhaps surpassing Licensed To Ill, which initially sold 4M up to that point. Paul's Boutique sold 500,000, although considering all the good press but bad public response, I would say it most likely "shipped" 500,000 (i.e. instant gold) but probably hung around in distribution warehouses. I may be wrong on that, but also keep in mind too that early on, there were also two distinct vinyl pressings: the original with the 8-panel gatefold, and a pressing with a regular gatefold, with the record in that being the exact pressing as the 8-panel. My point is, Capitol pressed up the record and at a time when vinyl pressings for records were becoming "limited edition" (or "first come, first come"), so stores always had CD's and tapes in stock. However, Grand Royal also pressed up the double LP pressing, and Capitol later came out with the 20th anniversary edition. Those were deemed as reissues, however limited. While Capitol has never made the album OOP, that technically means it remained "in print", and now with iTunes, it is never out of print until it becomes "out of circulation".
I don't live in a place that plays a lot of Beastie Boys on the radio, and when I do hear them, it's always "Sabotage" or "(You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Party)", but in other cities, I'm sure you'll always hear "It's The New Style" and "Shadrach" somewhere. If each of these songs are on comps, be it CD or DVD, then that technically counts as a "new release".
Of course, one doesn't have to get technical to realize that what TufAmerica is suing for is essentially 9 seconds of content. That's six seconds on Paul's Boutique. If this truly opens the gates, then that's 3180 more seconds to deal with.
I read an interview with Mr. F a few weeks ago talking about his reasoning with purchasing songs, and it was simply to buy "dead weight" (my term) in terms of soul and funk that was considered wasteful compared to Motown and Stax, but was of value to hip-hop producers and DJ's as a source pool. Just like major labels used to purchase OOP songs that were someone else's "oldies but goodies", thus becoming the intellectual properly of a company that had no input with the original, Mr. F did the exact same thing with not only soul, funk, and disco, but some hip-hop as well. In other words, he simply did what no one else had done or thought of at the time. I believe when Timberlake sampled Eddie Bo in "SexyBack", before the album was properly released, there were lawsuits thrown towards Timbaland and TImberlake. I do wonder if any part of these earned royalties go back to existing family members of these songwriters/musicians, or does everything now begin and end with Mr. F.
In the end, most of the material owned by Fuchs was not in the public domain, but was low on the totem poll compared to everything else Rhino would reissue. In fact, I remember begging Rhino Records to do some serious soul and funk reissues, and they were like "this is not of value to us". In the UK, Rhino/Atlantic would release a wealth of comps and reissues, and it was only because of how many of those were sold did we get a very small handful of comps finally come through from Rhino (with liner notes from Mr. O). We all know there's still a wealth of stuff Rhino/Atlantic never touched, and while WEA Japan have done its share of reissues, that only went on the surface.
Not unlike this potential lawsuit.
I don't know what the US statute of limitations is in respect of copyright infringement, but I'm fairly certain it's expired in the case of the first infringement, i.e., the original release of Paul's Boutique. Of course, if the album gets reissued with a different catalogue number, then technically it becomes a new product and there's a new infringement, so the SoL applies for the release of the most recent infringing product. This is what happened to Run DMC when they got their masters back from Profile and reissued Raising Hell. The guys from The Knack came after them for It's Tricky on this basis. I imagine this is what Fuchs is doing. When you own publishing & master catalogues that have been as heavily plundered for samples as some of the ones he has the rights to, then you know to watch out for things like that.