Awkward Situation

[Anthony]

personal story here, no big deal if you aren't interested (and it's not even about anything serious, fortunately). it's about songwriting.

so i write this song. i like to record things quickly - even a barebones version (what i call "skeleton") of the song - so i don't forget how it's supposed to sound. kinda easy to forget vocal melodies and guitar parts so i like to put it down. i get excited about this one song i wrote so knowing that i can't sing i want my best friend (who, along with me, thought we'd wind up being rockstars...*sigh*) to record the vocals on his PC and send them back to me. i figured if i was gonna be listening to the skeleton for some time as i tweaked the song and it evolved i at least wanted to have decent vocals. i sent the skeleton to my best friend. here's what the skeleton contained:

1. lyrics for the 1st verse (and only verse i had written at that time since it was still in its toddler stage) and lyrics for the chorus.
2. my vocals where i sung (badly) how the vocal melody should go for both the verse and the chorus
3. the guitar track for both the verse and the chorus

so that's vocal melody and lyrics for the verse and chorus PLUS the music. essentially that's 75% of the song right there, even in a skeleton format.

he digs it A LOT.

so much so what he send me back is a version of the song that he created. he added a little extra something to the vocal melody of the verse, but we're talking Vanilla Ice trying to argue that Ice Ice Baby's beat was different than Queen's "Under Pressure". the change wasn't groundbreaking. he also puts down a r&b style beat to it. he added lyrics of his own to the verse. everything else was kept intact, vocal melodies and guitar music. i didn't ask him to do that since if you have 75% of a song already done there's no reason to get input from someone for that extra 25% just to share writing credits with. i didn't have a problem with his version - it sounded good. however once he emailed it to a bunch of other guys we used to play with and hailed it as a song that "we" wrote - i lashed out in anger.

bear in mind - i know i will never be a rockstar (*sigh*), that having been said that doesn't mean i don't want to protect my intellectual property. we cleared the air and everything seemed fine, then he emailed me this:

"This'll actually be cool having two different takes on the same song: It's like Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (the song, not the album)...they had the original, popular version that you always hear before "With a Little Help From My Friends", and then at the end of the album they had Sgt. Pepper's (Reprise)...the two songs are joined by a common theme, but one was kinda like a throwback or reminder of the original, two totally different vibes (Oasis did the same thing with their song "All Around the World") "

i sent him a very lengthy email where i said basically "there is no two different takes on the same song. there's only the one song, the one that i wrote and am putting the finishing touches on so you can sing the stuff i wrote". there was more to it than that, but i really got wordy here.

who's to blame here? should i have stopped him in his tracks as soon as he sent me his unsolicited version? i'll admit i was flattered that something i created could inspire someone else to create, that's mainly why i never interrupted him as he would show me some ideas he had for the song. i never thought he'd take it as far as he did. its like when you're a parent and your teen says he wants a motorcycle. "yeah, yeah", you say, "whatever". lo and behold your teen saves and saves and a year later they show up with a motorcycle. sure, your teen is wrong for doing something without asking you but there's a side of you that says "if only i was more firm in the beginning i could have just stopped this". you never bothered to protest since teens say they want a lot of things and never come through. that's the situation i'm in, my friend did all of this on his own and i just thought it'd be one of those things that sits on your harddrive and you move on to something else.

i've since sent him other songs i wrote where i told him those were open to collaboration, but this one i'm talking about is my baby. what do you guys think? i know i'm not wrong - hey, i wrote the song - its just what are some opinions?

[RendeR]

Honestly HA, if you've collaborated at all in the past he probably sssumed it was ok to run wild with the creativity. If this song is that important to you tell him so, but do it calmly and make sure he understands its not just another tune to you that this one is "yours" and you just wanted his vocals to listen to while you tweaked it.

If he doesn't understand that then I dunno what you ought to do really. He's already told others about it so copyright could be a tough issue on this one.

Good luck.

[Anthony]

the version he recorded of my song was really good too, that adds to my quandry. its a nice version. but if you were to take the music of "Back in Black" and record your own lyrics and change up the style of the song so it's more funky - yeah it's something you created and its your version - but its not your song. you couldn't claim co-writing it since you added your own flair.

how does it work when an artist rerecords someone else's song in an entirely new way (like Hendrix doing "All Along The Watchtower" or Clapton's "After Midnight"). even if the new artist creates a new arrangement and makes say a reggae song out of a power ballad the original songwriter still has to be credited for writing the lyrics and chord progression, right?

my friend's stance was he basically reimagined my song. my stance is i finally told him i wasn't giving him permission to use the music i wrote nor the lyrics to the chorus nor the vocal melody. ultimately without those elements all he's got are lyrics. i created so much of the song (even in his version) that if we were to walk away with the parts we wrote i'd still have the skeleton of a song and he'd have words on a piece of paper. i can always write new words (which i have wound up doing), but he'd actually have to create a new song basically to make use of those lyrics.

[JPhillips]

What's the resistance to sharing a writing credit? Of you like what he did with the song, what's it matter?

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by RendeR

Honestly HA, if you've collaborated at all in the past he probably sssumed it was ok to run wild with the creativity. If this song is that important to you tell him so, but do it calmly and make sure he understands its not just another tune to you that this one is "yours" and you just wanted his vocals to listen to while you tweaked it.

If he doesn't understand that then I dunno what you ought to do really. He's already told others about it so copyright could be a tough issue on this one.

Good luck.

thanks ren. i don't want to get into "legality" here. we're friends afterall. fortunately for me i still have the email i sent him where i originally said "hey check this out, i want you to sing the vocals on this song i wrote" and i have the skeleton version of the song i sent him. email is timestamped.

it's a total misunderstanding on his part, and i didn't help matters by allowing him to continue to create his ideas on something cuz i was just being a friend and i, knowing this song won't ever see the light of day on the radio, didn't think it was necessary to get so protective on it.

he's only showed it to two other people, and i quickly stepped in and set the record straight which he agreed with.

[RendeR]

I guess it comes down to whether he is honest enough to not use your stuff in his version, I have little faith in human nature, so my gut instinct says he'll do whatever the hell he wants unless he's a real stand up guy.

Then you are forced to act, do you drop it, do you go to court? these types of things can be friendship killers. Hope it works out.

[RendeR]

Sounds like you dealt with it already then. Good for you. Wish I had any talent for songwriting =)

I can Sing though. No matter how many local dogs disagree with me.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

What's the resistance to sharing a writing credit? Of you like what he did with the song, what's it matter?

thanks for checking in, further conversation is good for me to flesh out my thoughts.

put it this way. he's shown me 3 songs of his that were also barebones. full lyrics, an acoustic guitar playing the music and his vocals. i took those three songs and added a bass line and a generic drum beat with some software here to flesh out the song. he doesn't have such a phenominal voice (like Britney Spears doesn't have amazing vocal talent but she's still a performer nonetheless) that a song with just him and his guitar would be on heavy rotation on your ipod, we'll put it that way. i sent him and the other 2 guys my "edited" version. at no time did i insinuate my edits were "the" edits, or did i claim we wrote the song together. i even labelled the mp3s i sent as "[insert song title here] (my last name version)"...

maybe like ren said, stuff like that kinda fostered the notion that everything we shared together was open collaboration. in his case he had a finished song that i just added color to, in my case i showed him something that was still being worked on. just sucks he did it in such an unsolicited way and felt what he added constituted having ownership of the song. his version doesn't equate into ownership in a song anymore than my taking the main elements of Back in black (chorus, chord arrangements, etc) and adding in my new lyrics for the verses wouldn't constitute my having wrote a new song. i can't say "there's the Back in Black that Angus/Malcolm Young wrote and then there's the version i came up with that incorporates the main themes of that song, but i contributed enough in my version that i can consider myself a co-writer on the song i recorded".

artists who release music on the radio can't stop someone from taking a song of theirs and rerecording it in a way that person feels the song should have been. anyone can do that in the confines of their own home. but the song that ensues doesn't become a case where you can claim any contribution to the song, its not something you could release as having partial writing credit on just cuz you took it upon yourself to make up your own version. i can recreate the Mona Lisa as pop art, at the end of the day its Da Vinci's work and anything i do is based off of his creation. different versions, reimagining it - whatever - it's still his work.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by RendeR

I guess it comes down to whether he is honest enough to not use your stuff in his version, I have little faith in human nature, so my gut instinct says he'll do whatever the hell he wants unless he's a real stand up guy.

Then you are forced to act, do you drop it, do you go to court? these types of things can be friendship killers. Hope it works out.

it wouldn't go that far, he's the godfather of my firstborn. again, the legality of all this is irrelevant. you won't ever hear of my friend (unfortunately) just like you won't ever hear my song on the radio (unfortunately). but stardom isn't a prerequisite for creating art or defending it. thanks for not being your normal dickish self. you have some good insight into this.

rather, this is all about recognition and crediting proper ownership in the song among our circle and people in the spheres of our influence. i told him i feel stupid for having to act so harsh over something the outside world won't hear, but for something that means so much to me i wouldn't be able to sleep at nite knowing someone thinks he had a hand in my song.

[RendeR]

Originally Posted by Anthony

thanks for not being your normal dickish self. you have some good insight into this.

Dude, I only bring out the dick when warranted, this was a legitimate situation that you obviously cared about a lot. I can BE a dick, doesn't mean I'm an asshole

Toss me an MP3 of it when its finished, my curiosity is piqued.

[M GO BLUE!!!]

Have you considered finishing it with a different vocalist and sending him the track, saying "This is what I envisioned!"

[The Afoci]

member when i wrote a song about my mom. she changed her name but tattooed it on your ass so all the old drunk guys would remember the drunk girl they did when she was hot.

[digamma]

If you don't care about the legal aspects, it sounds to me like you're being a douche bag. If you can finish your version of the song, why not let him have his take on the song too? Maybe he handled the initial situation poorly, but I think you need to cowboy up.

[The Afoci]

Originally Posted by digamma

If you don't care about the legal aspects, it sounds to me like you're being a douche bag. If you can finish your version of the song, why not let him have his take on the song too? Maybe he handled the initial situation poorly, but I think you need to cowboy up.

I once thought I had an idea for a good song. The toilet finished flushing and I lost the beat. I could never get it back.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by M GO BLUE!!!

Have you considered finishing it with a different vocalist and sending him the track, saying "This is what I envisioned!"

To be honest, I kind of like this answer.

[Karlifornia]

I once tried to record a cover of "Forever Young" by Alphaville, but I couldn't get past the second verse without breaking down in tears.

[DeToxRox]

If memory servies, just pop in a Mentos.

[DeToxRox]

Originally Posted by Anthony

personal story here, no big deal if you aren't interested (and it's not even about anything serious, fortunately). it's about songwriting.

so i write this song. i like to record things quickly - even a barebones version (what i call "skeleton") of the song - so i don't forget how it's supposed to sound. kinda easy to forget vocal melodies and guitar parts so i like to put it down. i get excited about this one song i wrote so knowing that i can't sing i want my best friend (who, along with me, thought we'd wind up being rockstars...*sigh*) to record the vocals on his PC and send them back to me. i figured if i was gonna be listening to the skeleton for some time as i tweaked the song and it evolved i at least wanted to have decent vocals. i sent the skeleton to my best friend. here's what the skeleton contained:

1. lyrics for the 1st verse (and only verse i had written at that time since it was still in its toddler stage) and lyrics for the chorus.
2. my vocals where i sung (badly) how the vocal melody should go for both the verse and the chorus
3. the guitar track for both the verse and the chorus

so that's vocal melody and lyrics for the verse and chorus PLUS the music. essentially that's 75% of the song right there, even in a skeleton format.

he digs it A LOT.

so much so what he send me back is a version of the song that he created. he added a little extra something to the vocal melody of the verse, but we're talking Vanilla Ice trying to argue that Ice Ice Baby's beat was different than Queen's "Under Pressure". the change wasn't groundbreaking. he also puts down a r&b style beat to it. he added lyrics of his own to the verse. everything else was kept intact, vocal melodies and guitar music. i didn't ask him to do that since if you have 75% of a song already done there's no reason to get input from someone for that extra 25% just to share writing credits with. i didn't have a problem with his version - it sounded good. however once he emailed it to a bunch of other guys we used to play with and hailed it as a song that "we" wrote - i lashed out in anger.

bear in mind - i know i will never be a rockstar (*sigh*), that having been said that doesn't mean i don't want to protect my intellectual property. we cleared the air and everything seemed fine, then he emailed me this:

"This'll actually be cool having two different takes on the same song: It's like Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (the song, not the album)...they had the original, popular version that you always hear before "With a Little Help From My Friends", and then at the end of the album they had Sgt. Pepper's (Reprise)...the two songs are joined by a common theme, but one was kinda like a throwback or reminder of the original, two totally different vibes (Oasis did the same thing with their song "All Around the World") "

i sent him a very lengthy email where i said basically "there is no two different takes on the same song. there's only the one song, the one that i wrote and am putting the finishing touches on so you can sing the stuff i wrote". there was more to it than that, but i really got wordy here.

who's to blame here? should i have stopped him in his tracks as soon as he sent me his unsolicited version? i'll admit i was flattered that something i created could inspire someone else to create, that's mainly why i never interrupted him as he would show me some ideas he had for the song. i never thought he'd take it as far as he did. its like when you're a parent and your teen says he wants a motorcycle. "yeah, yeah", you say, "whatever". lo and behold your teen saves and saves and a year later they show up with a motorcycle. sure, your teen is wrong for doing something without asking you but there's a side of you that says "if only i was more firm in the beginning i could have just stopped this". you never bothered to protest since teens say they want a lot of things and never come through. that's the situation i'm in, my friend did all of this on his own and i just thought it'd be one of those things that sits on your harddrive and you move on to something else.

i've since sent him other songs i wrote where i told him those were open to collaboration, but this one i'm talking about is my baby. what do you guys think? i know i'm not wrong - hey, i wrote the song - its just what are some opinions?

I am pretty sure you just watched Rockstar, and this didn't really happen.

[Karlifornia]

Originally Posted by DeToxRox

If memory servies, just pop in a Mentos.

What's funny is that a while back I was listening to NPR, and they had the guy who wrote the actual Mentos' theme (Mentos, Fresh and full of liiiiiife...), and Anthony's story is eerily similar. In fact, the Mentos theme was in 'skeleton' form for about 8 years.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by M GO BLUE!!!

Have you considered finishing it with a different vocalist and sending him the track, saying "This is what I envisioned!"

nah, we're best friends. that's a move i would do if i was prepared to not have him as a friend anymore.

i'm simply going to have the song copywritten. only costs $35. i believe in it, it's a good song in my opinion and its something i would listen to often. i have no problem putting this song on an ipod playlist and letting others hear it at like a party. it's just when i'm asked who performed the song i want to say "i wrote the music and lyrics".

fortunately my friend responded favorbly to my lengthy email. its now been completely squared off, my version that i'm recording is *the* version and his essentially doesn't exist as far as releasing it to the public is concerned (although i'm sure it exists on his PC, but what we do in the privacy of our own homes is no one's business). i can rerecord Stairway to Heaven as a funk reggae version with alternate lyrics that i listen to for my own personal enjoyment and Page/Plant could never do anything about it.

[JediKooter]

Does the song have anything to do with midgets serving chips at a Cinco De Mayo party?

[sterlingice]

Originally Posted by RendeR

Dude, I only bring out the dick when warranted, this was a legitimate situation that you obviously cared about a lot. I can BE a dick, doesn't mean I'm an asshole

Toss me an MP3 of it when its finished, my curiosity is piqued.

Oh, great. Now you're going to have RendeR trying to redo your song, too

SI

[Crim]

Okay. I'm being completely serious:

When I saw the thread title, and Hell Atlantic as the OP, I thought that this line:

Spoiler

Originally Posted by Anthony

i assure you, if i paid for her virginity at the end of the nite she would feel disgusted to be in her own skin. i would sicken myself at the things i would do to her. she would essentially be a bunch of holes and appendages available for my pleasure and experimentation/curiosity. i'm talking vomiting in her anus, then sodomizing her, withdrawing my penis from her vomitized asshole and making her taste it. for $3.7million one or both of us is gonna be vomiting - my stomach fluids would definitely play a role in the festivities . it's not going to be pretty. i would lose my humanity on this person for $3.7million.

Originally Posted by Anthony

i would sell my video to a vomit fetish site.

and sites where people enjoy slurping pureed pork and eggs out of the ass cracks of women, you know, cuz the internet has something for everyone.

Originally Posted by Anthony

put it this way. you and i want to take a flight to Vegas. we're both in NY, and the cost to go from JFK one way, coach, is (random amount here) $300. fine, we both say, that sounds reasonable. you however decide you would like to fly first class because you've never been to Vegas before and you want to fly in style. your cost for a first class ticket is (random amount here) $1,200.

you don't have a problem paying 4x more than i because you are expecting service and ammenities above and beyond what is standard for a $300 ticket in coach.

if you are going to fly first class you are going to want things that would seem out of the realm of reach (and rightfully so) of the average air traveller. you are going to expect complimentary drinks in a plush VIP lounge where you're seated well before the others. you're going to expect high quality blankets and pillows. roomier bathroom. premium food and beverages. a more personal interaction with your flight attendant.

as soon as this chick swiped my credit card in the Bunny Ranch, we would go up to our designated room, the door would be locked.

and all bets would be off.

it would be advisable for the fire dept, members of PETA and a representative of the Food and Drug Administration to be kept on hand in the event of unforeseen circumstances.

Originally Posted by Anthony

i didn't want to share this with the group, but fine - i'm gonna put it out there. i disgusted myself last nite while i was "getting to know myself better", or "giving myself personal attention through my hands" (wink wink) because what i used as stimulation was one scenario involving me and this virgin that i paid $3.7million to. what put me over the top was the image of me squeezing her virgin breasts. anyone can squeeze boobs, you might tell yourself, what's so special about that? i wouldn't be so much interested in the actual squeezing of her mammaries, moreso it would be the point where you've squeezed so hard that it no longer resulted in pleasure but severe discomfort. you know the part when she starts to realize "oh my god, *ouch* this isn't pleasurable at all, i actually think he's trying to hurt me".

cost of a plane ticket to Nevada: $300
cost of devirginizing a virgin: $3.7million
the look on a virgin's face where horror and concern and panic show up in her eyes and she realizes her pleasure is of no relevance to you and that her safety may be in danger: priceless

EDIT:
$5K: the cost of a good divorce attorney if your wife should ever read these posts and discover she's living with a monster.

...had actually happened.

Glad it's about something else.



Oh, and Afoci's back. Great.

[Anthony]

Ward Cleaver never ran into those problems, when you think about it.

"On today's episode of 'Leave It To Beaver': Ward gets caught posting on a message board the disgusting things he would do to a virgin he paid $3.7million to fornicate with. Guest starring Miley Cyrus as the entrepreneurial virgin."

[Anthony]

and yes, i understand Miley Cyrus is underage. i figure if i'm gonna go to hell might as well have a first class ticket.

[RendeR]

There is a special layer of hell for men like you, a VERY special place..."

[CU Tiger]

song writing credits are over rated....
I have one on a song that was included on a platinum album, think I made $20 off that...

That said tell him his version sucks, spend 15 years re recording his version with someone else playing guitar and then release it, make it an obvious chop and paste to get his awesomeness on tape and call it North Korean Democracy...instant platinum album