Sonicmuse Music Licensing & Publishing

Few projects tap as many skill sets at one time as the new Team Direct, Detroit, MI, created campaign for Microsoft's Sync did for original music/sound design house Expansion Team (www.expansionteam.org). The three-spot campaign for the revolutionary new Bluetooth syncing device found in exclusively in new Ford, Lincoln & Mercury vehicles, featuring visuals from Expansion Team sister company EyeballNYC, New York, needed equal parts original music and sound design, music supervision/remixing tracks from the bands The Strokes, Flaming Lips and Band of Horses, and licensing a track from Expansion Team's own library ? the New York-based band Beasts of Eden's song "End Times." The campaign is currently airing nationally.

"This is a great example of how we can be a complete musical resource for our clients," Alex Moulton, Expansion Team's Founder/Creative Director said. "Team Detroit came to us with a clear idea of what the product was and the tone for the campaign, but no specific idea of how it should be implemented. Our job was to come up with how to tell the story musically. I knew we needed an intro that needed to integrate with the songs from The Strokes, The Flaming Lips and Band of Horses. I also wanted to end each spot with something that would make you feel good. The overall aesthetic needed to be fluid and simple. My parents still have a hard time with their iPods so it was key for a Ford consumer to look at this and think it looks cool, not overly complicated and intimidating."

Visually the spots weave an eye-catching blend of 2D/3D animation and dramatic camera moves that bring to life the power of the Sync system. As the Expansion Team original music begins, we hear a voice say simply "this is Sync" as a car drives across a brilliant computer generated sunrise. In the spot featuring The Strokes, a voice says "play artist The Strokes" and suddenly stylized video images of the band pop up suddenly on the road like living billboards. As the voice offers other commands such as "call office" and "play genre rock" similar 3D images envelop the scene.

Musically the spots move effortlessly from Moulton's opening music, which deftly builds the tension toward the remixed versions of various songs and finally into the Beasts of Eden track that ends each of the three spots.

"The opening music is more a simple textural element in the same key as the song, it's there to set the mood and atmosphere of the campaign," said Moulton. "Visually we go on this journey and the audio needed to reflect that as well. Ultimately the challenge was about finding the right flow musically. "

Source: Broadcst Newsroom

Congress has introduced a bill dubbed the “Performance Rights Act” that would create a performance right in sound recordings on terrestrial radio. Currently, terrestrial radio does not pay a royalty to record labels and performers for the right to perform their music. Congress has given the broadcasting community an exemption from such a royalty, arguing the performance of music on terrestrial radio has promotional value sufficient to constitute compensation. Currently, a royalty for the performance of sound recordings is required of digital transmissions such as satellite radio and Internet radio.
“The legislation is a sign that Congress is beginning to recognize the inherent inequity in failing to provide fair compensation
to recording artists from the multi-million dollar radio conglomerates that use our members’ music to drive ad sales,” said John Simson, Executive Director of SoundExchange. “The bottom line is that any business needs to pay for its inputs. Businesses that earn a profit off the labor of others should pay those who do the work.”
SoundExchange is the music industry organization that collects and distributes royalties for satellite and Internet radio performances of sound recordings. Terrestrial radio does pay performance royalties to songwriters and music publishers via organizations BMI, ASCAP and SESAC for the right to perform the underlying musical composition - a separate piece of intellectual property. The bill is laid out in four primary sections.
First, the bill creates a royalty for terrestrial radio by striking the “digital” requirement and including terrestrial radio in the existing statutory system for digital broadcasts. Second, the bill includes special consideration for non-profit, educational and small broadcasters (grossing less than $1.25 million per calendar year), allowing these organizations to pay a reduced royalty.
Third, the bill requires the creation of a per-program license option for terrestrial broadcasts that make limited use of music.
Fourth, the bill includes a provision to protect songwriter royalties, stating: Nothing in this Act shall adversely affect in any respect the public performance rights of or royalties payable to songwriters or copyright owners of musical works. The bill has been introduced in both the House of Representatives and the Senate and has been referred to committee in both cases.

Source: Royalty Week

In case you haven't heard, the music business is in the toilet. File sharing has reduced the once untouchable big music labels to the level of toddlers left alone in the supermarket. With the sales of music constantly dropping, artists are feeling the effects too. Now, apparently, industry experts are saying that the money is now in licensing and music publishing.

NEW RULES OF THE GAME

A show like Grey's Anatomy licenses songs to be played throughout the show, which means exposure and a tiny bit of pocket change for the artists. It certainly worked for The Fray whose song "How to save a life" was featured on the hit television show and firmly placed it into our pop culture. It doesn't necessarily mean songwriters are the new kings of the castle, but as long as there is an audience willing to hear new music, then someone must be available to create it.

Songwriters, by and large, are the Rodney Dangerfields of the music business. Millions of people know the lyrics to that monster country hit of last year "Jesus take the wheel" and millions more know who sang it (Carrie Underwood), but how many people know it was co-written by Canadian Gordie Sampson?

Frustrated at the gaping holes he saw in the industry, Roy Elkins looked past his own songwriting career and saw a future in technology.

"My background has been in music since 1981 or '82," said Elkins. "The first company I was with was a keyboard company, then a company that made music software. My passion is song writing and the technology behind the industry and I sound holes that I could fill."

Elkins came up with the concept of Broadjam as a way for musicians and songwriters to catalogue their music on the Internet and have it available for publishing companies to find the next "How to save a life" to be played during a television show, movie or even video game. "The idea came about in 1999 and our first website went live in 2000. We've quietly built an audience and never advertised," said Elkins.

Now with 40,000 musician members and close to 60 new artists joining a day, Broadjam is beginning to be noticed by the industry. According to Elkins, 10-15 songs have already been placed in various things with more to come.

"Members have supplied music to the Dance Dance Revolution games, been placed on MTV, Disney, Oxygen, lot's of opportunities," said Elkins, adding that a placement could net the artist anywhere from $500 to $100,000 if placed in the opening sequence of a film.

"You still own your song and you get a performance royalty every time its played on T.V.," said Elkins. "The market is expanding rapidly. The Internet has made the playing field pretty level. Cable television has expanded over the last 10 years and there is music for every one of those shows."

Albertan song siren Samantha King has several of her songs on Broadjam and has been testing the songwriting waters since she was 13.

DRAWING FROM WITHIN

"In the past four years I've started writing a lot more," said King, attributing her new foray into entertainment on a cruise ship to inspiring her recent songwriting spurt.

King has been a rising star in the local country music scene for a while now and has had the chance of working with top songwriters in Nashville.

"Inspiration comes when you least expect it," said King. "Sometimes the words flow right out of my head and I end up writing for 10-35 minutes. I keep a journal and write my feelings down every day."

King found success in Sept. 2006 when a song she co-wrote for the John Lennon Songwriting Competition, was awarded the grand prize for "Best Country Song" in Session 1.

Pat Hatherly is also another aspiring songwriter on Broadjam. This Calgarian has been slugging it out in the music business since she was 12, but now has set her sights on the songwriting game.

"I'm pursuing songwriting because I was sick of being on the road as a musician," said Hatherly, who had played throughout Canada, Germany and Scandinavia.

According to Hatherly, the hardest part about songwriting is getting your songs performed by other artists.

"Sites like Broadjam get songs out there," said Hatherly. "Thank god for the modern age. I've made contact with great musicians and songwriters. You can't buy that kind of networking."

Broadjam also allows songwriters and musicians to give feedback on each other's works, something that Hatherly said she welcomes immensely.

So what makes a good song? "If you can get a movie going on in your head when you're listening, it's a good song," said Hatherly. "It doesn't matter the genre, if it makes you think and absorbs you into it, it works."

Source: Edmonton Sun

A film and television music industry poll conducted over the last two weeks by Film Music Magazine indicates overwhelming support for the US Performing Rights Organizations (PROs) ASCAP, BMI and SESAC to begin disclosing on member royalty statements details of the charges and fees they deduct from incoming payments to their members from foreign royalty societies. Currently, only the remaining amount after any charges, deductions and service fees is listed on member statements, leading some members to believe that this is the actual amount sent to them by the foreign societies. In fact, in most cases it is not, and the original amount sent to the member is not disclosed on member royalty statements, nor are the amounts of the charges and fees deducted from those incoming payments.

“Good business practices demand that financial service companies who handle hundreds of millions of dollars of money for others disclose their specific fees and deductions on member statements,” stated Film Music Magazine publisher Mark Northam. Northam continued, “These organizations quietly deduct millions of dollars every year in charges and fees from incoming foreign royalties and fail to disclose the details and amounts of these deductions on member royalty statements. To make matters worse, the policies adopted by many societies worldwide do not allow members of US societies to speak directly to the foreign societies, so there’s often no way for ASCAP and BMI members to confirm with a foreign society exactly how much money they were sent in care of their US society. This lack of transparency isn’t good for writers, and removes the most basic check and balance in any payment system – the ability to confirm the actual amount sent by the payor. We would never settle for this kind of lack of disclosure on a bank statement, and we shouldn’t tolerate it on royalty statements.”

The problem affects primarily writers, as US publishers often hire foreign subpublishers to collect performing rights royalties directly from foreign societies and remit those monies directly to the publishers, avoiding the foreign royalty departments at the US societies altogether. While publishers are allowed to appoint local collecting agents such as subpublishers, and can belong to both ASCAP and BMI at once, writers are only allowed to be a current member of one US society at a time and are generally prohibited from appointing local collection agents in foreign countries.

Source: Royalty Week

Crackdown pushes the action-driving hybrid genre into the next generation with the first ever truly 3-D playground. Enforce justice by any means necessary in Pacific City, a crime-ridden urban center primed to explode and ready for you to explore. Enter an interactive world where anything can be used as a weapon as you clean up the streets the only way you know how. Your way.

Developed by Scotland’s Real Time Worlds exclusively for Microsoft Game Studios and the Xbox 360 console, Crackdown is the brainchild of Dave Jones, the creative genius behind many innovative game titles.

M4G recently caught up with Peter Davenport, Music Acquisition and Editorial Manager, Microsoft Corporation, to discuss the game's soundtrack which features over a 100 music artist tracks including Amon Tobin, Atlas Plug, Celldweller, Hybrid and Robert Miles.

M4G: First of all please tell us about your musical background and how you got started working in the video game industry as a music supervisor?
Peter Davenport: In the 60s, I had a somewhat schizophrenic music life, receiving classical training privately on pipe organ and piano for 8 years with a Stanford professor, while playing in a pretty terrible rock band from time to time on weekends. In those years, I regularly went to the Avalon Ballroom and the Filmore in SF during the Haight Ashbury days. I attended Oberlin Music Conservatory in the early 70s but ended up my college years in Santa Cruz, Ca. where I was involved with helping friends get the Kuumbwa Jazz Center, a nonprofit music club, off the ground.

After three years at Kuumbwa, also producing jazz and world music radio programs on KUSP-fm, I moved to Seattle to attend graduate school in ethnomusicology, mostly to be around Zimbabwe musician, Dumisani Maraire and an extraordinary ethnomusicologist, Robert Garfias. I then spent a year in Sierra Leone, West Africa on a Fulbright music research project and returned to Seattle to co-teach American Popular Music courses at UW, played in an African Pop band with a bunch of other ethno doctoral students and eventually became Program Director at the Northwest Folklife Festival in Seattle.

Later, following a 2 year stint in 1994-1996, brainstorming and piloting music education programs for Paul Allen’s still developing Experience Music Project (known then as the Jimi Hendrix Museum), I joined the Audio Acquisitions team at Microsoft, which at that time had five pre-doc ethnomusicologists working primarily on cd-rom products such as Encarta, World Atlas, Music Central, Africana, Autoroute and others. When Xbox started up in 2000, I began working on the first version of Project Gotham Racing, then NFL, NBA, Amped, Hockey, Top Spin, Rallisport, Forza, & the subsequent versions of Gotham and Crackdown.

M4G: Describe the role of a music supervisor for video games. What does the process involve and what credentials are needed…lots of contacts with record labels and music publishers?
Peter Davenport: I probably work a little differently from most music supervisors. Rather than dictate to teams based on a marketing concept or my own individual taste, which is admittedly eclectic to the extreme, I enjoy working collaboratively with audio leads to match the creative goals of product teams. I’m not primarily focused on major label artists that are currently at the top of the charts because, by the time a game comes out, those tracks are often passé and overexposed. Some major label rising stars can be good but I’m just as interested in cutting edge, up-and-coming indie artists that are considered cool by sub-cultural groups rather than the larger mass market. So that I can bring the fullest possible scope of possibilities to a project, I’m continuously communicating with scores (a couple hundred actually) of indie labels and music publishers along with the majors about their current and upcoming releases.

M4G: How did you go about selecting music for Crackdown? Did you receive any specific brief or requests from the dev team or was I given free reign?
Peter Davenport: Crackdown was truly unique. Normally, we have 9-12 months or less to work on music for a project and timeliness and currency of the music is considered important. In this case, I began nearly 3 years ago to go over very detailed briefs about how specific types of music might function in Crackdown to support character types, scenarios, and a generic urban environment. I was given free reign to find music from any source and it didn’t have to be timely music necessarily, but I did work closely with the audio leads at Realtime Worlds, Raymond Usher and Stuart, who gave me detailed feedback on each and every track I handed-off, telling me what would work for certain characters, what wouldn’t work at all, and so on. Through this initial back and forth process, I quickly adjusted to precisely what they were looking for and the three of us ultimately refined down to a good tight list that fit the tone of the game. The nice thing was that the team wasn’t interested in name artists per se. In fact, they were surprised and relieved that Marketing factors were not going to dictate what we could do aesthetically with in-game music.

M4G: How would you describe the music vibe of Crackdown?
Peter Davenport: We have some totally different styles of music in Crackdown that you won’t hear in any other game….from Mexican hip hop, to East European rock to DJ Krush’s and Robert Miles’ inimitable styles of electronica. Although there is powerful, intense music in there, overall the vibe is dark and ominous rather than super high energy, which probably throws some people off because it’s not your typical game music. A few reviewers didn’t get that concept at all, didn’t know the artists and felt it was weird and not kick-ass enough. As game concepts call for more than just ‘kick ass’ music tho, I think gamers will understand, that game music, much like with film scores, contributes to the action, the environment and to character identification. It’s not just there as an extra throw-in and it’s not there just to promote a currently popular artist. If you really look and listen with an open mind to the music in Crackdown, I think you’ll be amazed at the uniqueness and artistic depth of it. Most of the music will grow on you the more you play the game rather than get old and tiresome.

M4G: There are many artists in the Crackdown soundtrack that will be familiar to gamers such as Amon Tobin, Atlas Plug (aka Tom Salta), Celldweller and Hybrid.What are some of my personal favorites?
Peter Davenport: Of course, I love what Amon Tobin does with tracks like ‘Cat People’ and ‘Escape’ but I also like Aphrodite’s ‘Calcutta’, Kinky’s ‘Mas’ and Robert Miles’ ‘Release Me’ and ‘Inductive’. It’s also cool that we could use some small independent producers like Om Theory (Greg Wiseman), and Julian Beeston as well as a track by Supercruizer (Gabriel Le Mar and Toby Izui) I’m a big fan of the way DJ Krush uses live traditional Japanese musicians combined with electronica. And, the Mexican hiphop of Molotov and Control Machete – which some might find almost too intense at times – is a breathtaking, pounding, urban expression that really works for that specific character in Crackdown.

M4G: Are the tracks just used like a radio playlist format or is there some interactive application as well? If so, how do you secure stems of the tracks from the original master recordings in order to implement?
Peter Davenport: Unlike with Project Gotham Racing 2, when we had an extensive radio playlist format and over 200 tracks of music introduced by radio DJs, this is not the case with Crackdown. We didn’t secure stems but simply used tracks as they’re heard on commercial recordings.

M4G: What are the fees typically associated with licensing music?
Peter Davenport: I can’t discuss the specifics of licensing fees for obvious reasons. One can figure, however, that with a game that has over a hundred tracks of music as with Crackdown, the per-track licensing fee has to be more reasonably priced than with a game that has only a few tracks of licensed music. And, of course, fees will vary depending upon how they’re used in a game – upfront for the opening video or contained deeper in the game with lots of other tracks.

M4G: Do the artists retain their own publishing and mastering rights?
Peter Davenport: If you mean, are we asking for exclusive rights to use these tracks; No, the artists have retained their own publishing and master rights in conjunction with their publishers and labels.

M4G: What can be done to keep music licensing costs down?
Peter Davenport: Good question. In Crackdown, you’ll notice that we have pop-up chyrons showing the name of the artist with track title as a track is playing. When game players hear something they like, they’ll know immediately what it is so they can then buy the track or album through a download service. We hope this year to do even more with the Zune music service and Xbox Live to have features on artists in MGS games. All of this gives additional motivation to artists and their labels to provide music at reasonable rates so game costs, which are already considerable, can be minimized. I want to see musicians, publishers and labels get a fair share…but, of course, music is just one aspect of a game; there are many other production costs that really add up.

M4G: Is the music considered a part of the marketing cost or development/production budget?
Peter Davenport: In the case of Crackdown and most other projects I’ve worked on, music is primarily a production cost. If it’s possible for Marketing to get involved with one or two artists in their larger marketing campaign, they can sometimes complement a production budget but this doesn’t generally have a significant impact on our overall music budgets.

M4G: Do you think game companies will/should ever pay royalties to music artists based on sales of the games?
Peter Davenport: Publishers and labels are understandably pushing for this but it’s not really feasible when you have over 100 tracks of music in Crackdown and 100+ tracks in Project Gotham Racing, for instance. Dealing with so many companies with that many separate tracks of music would be impractical and cost prohibitive. What we can do, however, is give as much information as possible to gamers about the artists in a game so they’ll know what recordings to look for to purchase. In the future, it would be good if game developers are able to make it easier and more seamless for gamers to purchase online what they’ve just heard in the context of a game.

M4G: Since licensing fees are still relatively low (depending on the stature of the band), why do you think games are such an attractive medium for music artists?
Peter Davenport: Although major labels may de-emphasize this for the sake of arguing for higher licensing fees, it’s pretty obvious to most that it’s a tremendous opportunity for artists to be included on a game soundtrack. Minimally, an artist and label themselves can promote the fact that they’re in a cool game. Indie labels get this totally. Artists get this totally. For major labels, although it’s a great way to complement their marketing campaigns, they’re in the business of having to sell massive quantities of popular artist recordings to cover costs, and they often don’t recognize the impact on sales. The relative bump in sales coming from their artists being in a game may get lost and therefore be deemed negligible. An indie label can see that bump and the resulting ‘buzz’ on blogs more clearly. It can have a major impact. Bottom line is that there is a captive audience listening to the soundtrack over and over and often hearing some very cool, new artists for the first time; it certainly doesn’t hurt!

Source: Music 4 Games

ASCAP CEO John Lofrumento has posted a letter to its members on the ASCAP website regarding their recent court loss. On April 25, the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York ruled that a download is a transmission of a reproduction of a musical work and does not constitute a public performance. The Court indicated that the ability to simultaneously hear the music was a prerequisite for a performance.

“Obviously, ASCAP respectfully disagrees with the Court’s decision,” says John Lofrumento’s letter. “We believe the law is otherwise, and must reflect the full value to these Internet services of the music created by our members. Endorsing ASCAP’s position were legal briefs from: BMI; SOCAN; SESAC; the Songwriters Guild of America, together with the Nashville Songwriters Association International (NSAI); and the NMPA, joined by the Church Music Publishers Association, Association of Independent Music Publishers and NSAI.”
ASCAP left open the possibility for an appeal.
“Now that the Court has ruled on this legal issue, the proceeding will go to trial to determine a reasonable license fee for the Internet services,” said the letter. “The trial is set to begin on September 10, 2007, and is scheduled to run for three weeks. There is no way to predict when the Court will issue its final judgment setting the license fees. However, once the Court rules on that issue, it will be possible for ASCAP to appeal the decision regarding downloads, as well as any other aspects of the case.”

Source: Royalty Week

The performing rights community is reeling from a major loss in what may be the most important music royalty legal case in decades. Last Wednesday, as originally reported in RoyaltyWeek, federal district court judge William Conner ruled against ASCAP declaring there is no performance right for writers and publishers in music downloads.
If not reversed on appeal or otherwise overturned, the decision could mean huge losses for composers who work under work-for-hire agreements on films and television shows as viewers migrate away from watching television “live” in favor of downloading films and TV episodes. Apple’s iTunes site alone has delivered over 18 million films and episodes of television shows. Composers historically receive no royalties for DVD or videotape sales or rentals, and often depend on performance royalties from ASCAP, BMI and SESAC generated from public performances of music on television and elsewhere for their livelihoods.
While ASCAP remained silent after the ruling, ASCAP’s opponents were quick to hail the decision as a major victory. Jonathan Potter, Executive Director of the Digital Media Association (DiMA) who filed an amicus brief in the case opposing ASCAP’s claim, said of the decision, “Today’s decision is a tremendous win for digital media services. DiMA has argued this case for almost a decade, and we are pleased the court agreed with our view of the law. Unfortunately, some digital media services have actually paid double-dip royalties when pressed by ASCAP, BMI and SESAC. We hope those companies will demand refunds - with interest.” Entertainment Merchants Association President Bo Anderson stated, “The position of ASCAP was nonsensical.
Digital downloads are not ‘public’ nor are they ‘performances.’ Had ASCAP prevailed in its attempted end-run around the clear and established definitions of copyright law, additional, non-productive royalty costs would have been added to motion picture and video game downloads, potentially stymieing this delivery system.” As of press time ASCAP has not announced whether it will appeal the ruling or not, and ASCAP’s website contained no mention of the ruling or any response to it.

Source: Royalty Week

A federal judge in New York on Wednesday dealt a potential blow to the future earning power of songwriters and music publishers, ruling that they are not entitled to receive performance royalties on paid digital downloads.

The ruling came as part of an ongoing copyright royalty rate dispute between the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP), a music licensing organization, and a group of three online media services, AOL, Yahoo and RealNetworks.

The question facing federal judge William C. Conner in the southern district of New York boiled down to this: Does the transmission of a music download constitute a performance along the lines of a song being played on the radio or streamed over the Internet?

If the judge had answered yes, it would have opened the door for songwriters and publishers to receive a performance royalty that would have come out to about 3 percent on every digital download, ac cording to Rick Carnes, president of the Songwriters Guild of America, which filed a brief in the case supporting ASCAP.

Performance royalties are paid for the public "transmission" of music whether by a radio station or in a bar. Songwriters and publishers also get 9.1 cents for each song sold on an album or a single.

Ruling spells defeat

Wednesday's ruling was viewed as a defeat for ASCAP and other organizations such as BMI and SESAC that administer performance royalties for songwriters and publishers.

"ASCAP respectfully disagrees with the court's decision," the organization said in a statement issued amid ASCAP board meetings that are being held in Nashville. "We are considering our options," the group said, in advance of a trial set to begin May 21 with AOL, Yahoo and RealNetworks to determine a new set of performance royalty rates.

But for Jonathan Potter, executive director of the Digital Media Association, a Washington-based trade organization, the ruling adds a dose of clarity to a patchwork of decades-old licensing requirements that don't always fit the digital age.

"This absolutely makes things clear," Potter said. "And if you're one of those ringtone companies that has been paying money to ASCAP, BMI and SESAC, go get your money back. The court has ruled that a download is not a public performance."

John Beiter, a Nashville attorney with Loeb & Loeb, who filed a so-called "friend of the court" brief on behalf of SESAC arguing that downloads, because they are a "transmission," constitute a public performance said he views this ruling as the starting point of a new discussion on the topic.

"This is not at all a closed debate," Beiter said. "Beyond the appeals courts, there's also the possibility for redress on Capitol Hill."

What the news means

In the larger scheme of what the news means for professional songwriters in Nashville and elsewhere, Carnes said this is just the latest economic injustice for tunesmiths and probably will make it harder for someone to eke out a living in the industry.

He estimated that a typical songwriter today could expect to receive no more than $18,500 in royalties stemming from sales of albums or a single that sell 1 million copies.

"That puts me $500 below the poverty line for a family of four and I've got a platinum album hanging on my wall," Carnes said. "Is it any surprise then that we've basically lost half of all the professional songwriters in America over the past 10 years?"

Source: Tennessean.com

Broadcast Music Inc. (BMI) and the Radio Music License Committee (RMLC) have come to terms on a three-year extension to the previous 10-year performing right agreement for commercial radio stations. The extension will provide increases in royalty revenues for BMI songwriters and publishers, as well as guaranteed fees for broadcasters. Fees for the period from 2007 to 2009 will continue to be calculated on the basis of the formula developed by the RMLC under the prior 10-year agreement. The extension includes provisions for per program music licensing, and also for high definition simulcasting and multicasting, and streaming over-the-air signals on radio station Web sites.

The agreement is retroactive to January 1, 2007. It has been submitted to Judge Louis J. Stanton in the Federal District Court of New York and it's expected that the judge will sign an Order on May 18 to finalize the agreement.

BMI President & CEO Del Bryant commented, "This three-year extension extends and expands our relationship with the radio industry in a mutually favorable manner. The new agreement offers the benefits of stability, simplified administration, and consistent fee levels to BMI and radio stations alike."

Keith Meehan, Executive Director of RMLC, said, "We are pleased to have reached this agreement with BMI and that our agreements now cover both Internet streaming of station signals as well as covering HD simulcasting. We are also pleased that BMI has agreed in principle to a joint radio music use study with RMLC."

Source: FMQB

Alexandra Patsavas -- the influential TV and film music supervisor who has helped put Death Cab for Cutie, Snow Patrol and the Fray on the mainstream map -- has inked a deal with Atlantic Records to form a new imprint called Chop Shop Records. The label shares the name of Patsavas' 10-year-old South Pasadena-based firm, Chop Shop Music Supervision.

Album sales are down and companies are downsizing, so a new label might not be the most intuitive business decision. But the Chop Shop deal is proof that good music still sells, the right A&R ears still drive the business, and film and TV have never been a more powerful vehicle to break artists.

Patsavas had been in negotiations with Atlantic president Julie Greenwald since last year. They concocted the label idea at the Coachella music festival.

"It's something we came up with together," Patsavas says. "A label seems like a natural extension of what a music supervisor does. ... You can come across things very early, and there have been bands along the way I would have loved to have worked with more closely."

Patsavas plans to hire a label manager and a handful of additional talent scouts and assistants to supplement the efforts of her existing Chop Shop music supervision team of three coordinators.

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No signings have been announced, but she is aggressively on the hunt for acts. I saw her at SXSW in Austin taking in quite a few shows, and during a recent trip to New York, she attended nine artist showcases.

"I've always been interested in indie rock, and it's the kind of music I tend to enjoy placing in the shows that I work on," Patsavas says. "(The label) will be an extension of the kinds of artists that have been featured on 'The O.C.' and 'Grey's Anatomy' soundtracks. Many of those artists have been unsigned or signed to small labels."

As for the prospect of landing acts on either of the labels in Chop Shop-supervised shows, Patsavas and Atlantic execs recognize the need to separate church and state. But the connection doesn't hurt.

She also is keeping the door open to Chop Shop distributing TV soundtrack albums where and if appropriate.

TV soundtracks enjoyed a boom year in 2006. Sales jumped 19% to more than 27 million units, according to Nielsen SoundScan, led by a string of hits on Walt Disney Records: "High School Musical," "Hannah Montana" and "The Cheetah Girls 2." Soundtrack albums from Patsavas-supervised shows likewise have performed solidly. "Grey's Anatomy Volume 2" -- which was nominated for a Grammy, rare for a TV soundtrack -- has sold almost 350,000 units. And the six volumes of the "Music From the O.C." soundtrack series have moved more than 1 million copies worldwide.

Of late, "Grey's Anatomy" has been particularly effective at creating sales momentum for bands by translating TV exposure into downloading activity. Weekly download sales of Snow Patrol's "Chasing Cars" jumped from fewer than 2,000 tracks to 21,000 after it was featured May 15 in the final minutes of the hospital drama's 2006 season finale. Songs from Gary Jules, the Fray, Regina Spektor and Anna Nalick have seen similar bumps after being on the show.


Source: The Hollywood Reporter