Category Archives: Music

Marilyn Manson and the Paparazzi

3 Replies

Because of the world we live in we are all familiar with the role of paparazzi in our society. They capture images of celebrities without their permission for publication. From a copyright standpoint these images are the property of the magazines that the paparazzi sell them to. I have posted previously about photography taken without permission and the copyright laws regarding such practices. Because you can’t sue every paparazzi and every tabloid magazine that publishes your picture celebrities usually use other means to ensure privacy like wearing masks or covering their faces.

Marilyn Manson uses a different approach. He writes the word fuck on his face so the magazines can’t publish the photos. I suppose this is more convenient compared to wearing a mask but you will probably get some looks at starbucks. Then again if your Marilyn Manson you probably don’t care.

Intersection of Perfomance and Art and Performance Art

Leave a reply

Why pay more for a concert when you can enjoy crystal clear music in the comfort of your own home? Anyone who has ever been to a concert, mosh, or other appearance of a favorite artist will tell you the experience is everything. The concert is an entirely different product than the music recording; the musician truly becomes an artist since she works with visual as well as sound media. Such is the case with a brilliant piece by the brilliant Amanda Palmer. Watching this video, I hope you’ll notice it is not your average straight song variety. She uses Gaga’s Bad Romance in a satirical performance which comments on Gaga herself as well as performance art in general. The fact that the song is not hers only emphasizes the other elements of the show that she had to plan and create. The choreography, wardrobe, sequencing, and original spoken parts are all products of Palmer, and come together to create a unique experience which is entirely hers. In this way, live performances would operate just like books under a copyright.

It’s all about that stage presence, baby

2 Replies

Looking forward in the music industry, musicians better have good stage presence, or they just won’t make it. With cheaper versions of albums and songs online coupled with good old-fashioned piracy artists just can’t make enough money on selling their own music. According to this intelligent fellow, music artists nowadays need to make their money on the tour. People may be reluctant to buy recordings, but there is no indication that they’re getting tired of the concert. After all, a concert is something that is not reproducible. Since it is live, each concert, even of the same sequence of songs, will be different. That makes live performance unique. Perhaps, if Bowie is right and copyright will dwindle in recording, it will instead supplant itself on live performances. Even such a complex experience as a performance can be traced to a musician’s intellectual property.

Live Vs Recorded (blog 10)

Leave a reply

I would think that the differential in costs when buying a recording (a song) or the cost of a live performance (concert) comes from the effect of hearing someone speak. An album is produced in a recording studio so the singer’s voice is processed and autotuned and mixed. A live concert is just that a live performance there is no machinery autotuning the singer’s voice you are hearing what they actually sound like, not what a major label wants the artist to sound like. I know of quite a few bands that are terrible live because their fans have gotten used to a certain sound that can only be created in a recoding studio. Therefore even though the costs of hearing a band live are much higher, it is one of the more intimate interactions fans can have with their favorite singers.

theoretically to record a live performance (concert or speech) would be considered theft, the talent is being paid by an institution to do what they do, either perform or speak, and by recording that for your own use and distribution you are stealing from what has already been paid for. The institution pays for the rights to sell tickets so you circumventing that you are stealing from them. However legally the only reproduction of the performance that would be legally defendable would be that which is recorded by the institution that paid for the original performance to happen in the first place, much like with book publishers buying the printing rights for works of literature.

Today’s Presentation – Professor Sikand

1 Reply

It was truly eye-opening today to hear Professor Sikand’s talk about copyright in the world of film, especially with the issue of the high costs associate with licensing music. What I found a bit saddening was the fact that these costs often dissuade filmmakers from making certain works. In a way, copyright in this case holding back the progression and evolution of film. Granted, we should protect artists and ensure that they do not lose out on revenue from their works. However, perhaps some efforts should be made to ease up on the rules regarding the usage of songs. After all, who knows what potentially great films the world could be missing out on because of all the restrictions in place?

Today’s Class – Using Songs vs. Product Placement (Shark Tank)

2 Replies

In the discussion in today’s class, somebody brought up the topic of song sampling vs product placement, particularly in movies and in television. Some people argued that if companies pay directors and producers to have products featured in movies and shows, artists should do the same thing for the exposure they are getting. I didn’t get to speak on the issue, but my argument has to do with the purpose of such actions. When a song is included in a show or movie, it is usually intended to impart some sort of mod in the particular scene where it is seen. In a sense, the song ends up becoming a part of the show or movie as an art form, and several movies are known for the music featured in them. Product placement doesn’t do any of this, as is seen in the example video below with one of my favorite shows, Shark Tank. The T-Mobile product placement here is not only utterly ridiculous, it adds nothing to the show in terms of value or artistic merit. If there was no licensing deal made here, there is no reason that the producers of the show would include this in there at all. Essentially, even though having a song featured in a movie or show gives exposure to the artist, it is because the directors and producers want to use the songs to ad to their work that differentiates this from product placement.

Documentary Filmmakers and Fair Use

Leave a reply

Today’s brownbag brought up some really interesting points.  One point that Professor Sikand mentioned was that many times documentary filmmakers become discouraged by the price of licensing copyrighted works.  This is a shame because most filmmakers do not have the budget of a Hollywood feature film and upon realizing how much the licensing of a song for their movie can be, they often decide against producing or finishing their work.  This prevents many important stories from being told.  Professor Sikand did mention that their is a light at the end of the tunnel.  She mentioned that there are websites that feature music that can be used freely in movies as long as the artist is credited. While reflecting on the short clip we watched where filmmakers were discussing copyrighted works in relation to their films, I decided to look a little bit more into this issue.  While searching the web I cam across this website which highlights documentary filmmakers’ statement of best practices in fair use.

Music Licensing Issue – Skins

1 Reply

When my group for Portfolio 2 was talking about what to write about, copyright relating to music was brought up about one of the topics. This got me thinking about an issue that arose several years back with one of my favorite tv shows of all time, the award-winning English drama Skins. Among the many great things about this show, one of them was the use of great music. However, an issue arose when releasing the DVD for the show. There was an issue because licensing the music for the DVDs would come with a high cost. So, completely different music was chosen to be put in the episodes released to the DVDs. The only way to buy the episodes with the original scores is to purchase them on Itunes. This is a real shame, because the music was one of the things that contributed to this show’s greatness. It almost feels as if something is lost with the original songs taken out.

Girl On Fire Case

1 Reply

Alicia Keys has recently been targeted in a copyright lawsuit involving her new song, “Girl On Fire.” It is claimed to have included a mere “two seconds” of material from the Eddie Holman’s song entitled, “Hey There Lonely Girl.” To me, this is absurd as the two songs sound nothing alike. If so many artists can get away with using the same chord sequence (mentioned in my previous blog post), how is Alicia Keys at fault?

This case seems to go along with what Vaidhyanathan was arguing for in the epilogue we read for class today. He claims, “Isn’t copyright supposed to encourage art?…Instead, copyright protection seems to be squelching beauty, impeding exposure, stifling creativity” (Vaidhyanathan 185). Even though the song that Keys has produced is completely different from Holman’s song, it seems to be on the chopping block due to copyright laws. Having listened to these two songs, being aware of this copyright case, I have tried to find evidence for Holman’s case. However, I couldn’t make any connections. I would never have guessed that these two songs were related had I not become aware of this through reading the above article. Thus, in this case, copyright seems to be overstepping its bounds.

4 Chords

1 Reply

This blog post was sparked by a quote from Brian’s blog post: “I have thought about this before. What if in 3000 years, every single possible combination of musical notes has been put together, so there would not be any more original music. What would copyright laws do then?”

At my high school, once a year, we put on a Coffeehouse Show-where people would perform short skits, or songs of whatever kind. One year, some students got up and began singing individual songs, but what was interesting about them was that they all had had the same basic 4 chords to them, much like in this video. In the music world, this does not seem to violate copyright laws. For example in the video, Journey is not given credit for the songs made after it that include the same 4 chords as it uses. However, in the writing world, one can not just take others’ words and get away with it. Each of the songs, although they incorporate the same four chords, are all given credit to be original works. I wonder why this works the way it does?