EXS 24 Logic Sampler Users Group

For what it's worth, I'd ALWAYS try and get as close to the source as 
possible and ask permission...saves you a lot of potential hassles down the 
road...when the billboard(not the mag)ad lawyers come after you to get 
someone a piece of your monsterhit...not worth the tylenol bills...Good 
luck,mn



>Does anyone know if it's legal to use other people's quotes as lyrics in a
>song? E.g. all vocoded up but still intelligible. Do you have to attribute
>the quote to the person in the song, or could you just give them credit in
>the liner notes? Would you have to get their permission, or the permission
>of the publisher of their book, to use the quote? I happen to live in the
>USA if it matters.
>
>Thanks!
>Jeremy
>http://www.ixks.com/~sadus
>




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Personally, I see nothing wrong with a vocoded sample, provided the phrase,
spoken by any person, does not constitute a copyrighted work in and of
itself. If there's no trace of the original recording (other than formant
control, I think your fine. Keep in mind, I'm not the most conservative
person on this list, and I am in no way offering you legal counsel. But I'd
have no problem sleeping at night if my use of the phrase was completely
changed. There are surely members of this list that might argue this point
with me, but I don't want to drudge out all the specifics of my reasoning.
Suffice it to say, it could be your voice recorded and vocoded or distorted
as far as anyone else is concerned. Better yet, just rerecord the sample
using your own voice. Then vocode the sample. No one would know the
difference if the effect is as drastic as you suggest. If not, and the
original recording is somehow intact, you are taking a risk. You get my
point I think.

There are some fascinating stories that touch on this theme in the book
"Confessions of a Record Producer" by Moses Avalon, which, if you're
interested, you can order from our site at http://MusicBootCamp.com. It's
the best book I've come across for blowing the lid off the music industry
and shares a lot of insights about this and many other issues. Specifically,
it deals with the music industry in the context of real-world scenarios
rather than the untested, hypothetical terms of many other books. My
apologies if this sounds like a sales pitch. No one ever appreciates my
advice about reading this book until after they have read it... Anyway, best
wishes... Jer

> For what it's worth, I'd ALWAYS try and get as close to the source as
> possible and ask permission...saves you a lot of potential hassles down the
> road...when the billboard(not the mag)ad lawyers come after you to get
> someone a piece of your monsterhit...not worth the tylenol bills...Good
> luck,mn
> 
> 
> 
>> Does anyone know if it's legal to use other people's quotes as lyrics in a
>> song? E.g. all vocoded up but still intelligible. Do you have to attribute
>> the quote to the person in the song, or could you just give them credit in
>> the liner notes? Would you have to get their permission, or the permission
>> of the publisher of their book, to use the quote? I happen to live in the
>> USA if it matters.
>> 
>> Thanks!
>> Jeremy
>> http://www.ixks.com/~sadus

>>> Does anyone know if it's legal to use other people's quotes as lyrics in a
>>> song? E.g. all vocoded up but still intelligible. Do you have to attribute
>>> the quote to the person in the song, or could you just give them credit in
>>> the liner notes? Would you have to get their permission, or the permission
>>> of the publisher of their book, to use the quote? I happen to live in the
>>> USA if it matters.

I'd like to add... if you're referring to sentences or paragraphs then
forget it! My last post only applies to phrases that, on there own, are not
likely to hold water as a copyrighted work. For example, there are numerous
songs that contain the words, "I love you." -- a phrase that, in and of
itself, is not a copyrightable work, but the recording of the phrase is
definitely protected. It is the recording that I am responding to. I am not
drawing any conclusions about how many words or joined phrases warrants a
copyright. You'll have to use prudent judgement in that case.. Jer

> I'd like to add... if you're referring to sentences or 
> paragraphs then forget it! My last post only applies to 
> phrases that, on there own, are not likely to hold water 
> as a copyrighted work. For example, there are numerous 
> songs that contain the words, "I love you." -- a phrase 
> that, in and of itself, is not a copyrightable work, but 
> the recording of the phrase is definitely protected. It 
> is the recording that I am responding to. I am not 
> drawing any conclusions about how many words or joined 
> phrases warrants a copyright. You'll have to use prudent 
> judgement in that case.. Jer


Thanks for the feedback! I'll definitely have to check out that book you
mentioned sometime. 

A friend of mine (very much into "new-age" stuff, e.g. books by
"channeled" authors etc) keeps sending me huge reams of "insightful
quotes", some of which would be pretty fun to use in a song. 

A lot of the quotes are from people I've never heard of before, and a lot
are from probably old authors possibly out of print now and/or deceased,
which I'll call "Type A quotes". Some examples (though I wouldn't want to
use all of these in songs): 

"Discovery consists in seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what
nobody has thought." - Albert Szent-Gyorgyi
"Iron rusts from disuse, stagnant water loses its purity and in cold
weather becomes frozen; so does inaction sap the vigors of the mind." -
Leonardo da Vinci

Some hwoever are "ancient proverbs" or attributed to "Anonymous", which
I'll call Type B quotes.. 

"Some pursue happiness -- others create it." - Anonymous
"Things turn out best for people who make the best of the way things turn
out." - Anonymous
"The person who says it cannot be done should not interrupt the person
doing it." - Chinese proverb


In your opinion do you think the "Type B" quotes would be any more "legal"
to use? And do you think the "Type A" quotes are effected at all if the
original speaker is now deceased? 


Cheers!
Jeremy
http://www.ixks.com/~sadus

> "Discovery consists in seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what
> nobody has thought." - Albert Szent-Gyorgyi
> "Iron rusts from disuse, stagnant water loses its purity and in cold
> weather becomes frozen; so does inaction sap the vigors of the mind." -
> Leonardo da Vinci

I wouldn't hesitate to use a quote like this in a song (as you mentioned, I
might not use this in particular). Point being, that these ancient quotes
are public domain. Feel free to quote Shakespeare or da Vinci... Jer

> In your opinion do you think the "Type B" quotes would be any more "legal"
> to use? And do you think the "Type A" quotes are effected at all if the
> original speaker is now deceased?

I depends purely on whether the quotes fall into public domain. Many, such
as Martin Luther King's famous speech recordings, I think (or hope) are
public domain. I've heard two songs released on fairly successful labels
over the past 20 years that trigger samples of that speech at length.

I would say that a truly anonymous phrase is public domain. Although you
don't always know if something is truly public domain or if someone stole it
and called it anonymous or public domain. An ancient Chinese proverb or
anonymous statement is cool as far as I am concerned.

I've had to deal with very similar issues myself. What I'm not 
clear on with you is whether when you're saying you're using 
quotes if you're using excerpts of recordings or whether you are 
reading the quotes out of a text. In other words, are you saying, "I 
have a dream," or are you using a tape of Martin Luther King 
saying, "I have a dream." It's a significant issue. See, you can, 
yourself, quote phrases and passages all day, as long as you 
give credit where credit is due (would be the liner notes in this 
case) and as long as you aren't taking another's work wholesale. 

For example, I wanted to incorporate a my reading of a poem by 
a particular poet into one of my songs. I was going to use the 
whole poem. As the poem is not public domain yet, I would have 
to get express permission to quote the poem in my recording. 
However, if I quoted a line from it, that would be considered 
allusion--it's fine. If I quoted two or three lines from it, that would 
be a quote--it would be fine as long as I credited the poet. The 
only problem came when I wanted to use the entire work. 

Using snippets of recordings is significanlty more complicated 
(as anyone who uses samples will tell you). Essentially, if what 
you are using comes from a public broadcast, you can use it. If it 
didn't, you have to obtain permission. We did a thing with Walter 
Cronkite reading the news and Ronald Regan speaking--right off 
the public airwaves. Was okay to incorporate into a song. We 
also used trailers from monster movies of the 50's. A bit more 
iffy. Even though these were commercials, it could be argued 
that we were using the intellectual property of whatever 
advertising company came up with the copy. 

If what you're doing is reading passages from a book of New 
Age quotes, you're absolutely fine with the anonymous or ancient 
ones. With the newer ones, you're fine as long as you stick to 
short quotes and attribute them in your liner notes.

--- In exs-users@y..., <HELP@M...> wrote:
> > In your opinion do you think the "Type B" quotes would be any 
more "legal"
> > to use? And do you think the "Type A" quotes are effected at 
all if the
> > original speaker is now deceased?
> 
> I depends purely on whether the quotes fall into public domain. 
Many, such
> as Martin Luther King's famous speech recordings, I think (or 
hope) are
> public domain. I've heard two songs released on fairly 
successful labels
> over the past 20 years that trigger samples of that speech at 
length.
> 
> I would say that a truly anonymous phrase is public domain. 
Although you
> don't always know if something is truly public domain or if 
someone stole it
> and called it anonymous or public domain. An ancient Chinese 
proverb or
> anonymous statement is cool as far as I am concerned.

Thanks again for all of the info! To answer your question Eorthman, I was
not planning on using audio samples, but reading the quotes myself (or
maybe making my girlfriend do it :P). That's an interesting point about
the public domain broadcasts though which opens up a whole new set of
doors. Time to finally get a mini-disc recorder I guess. :-)

Cheers!
Jeremy
http://www.ixks.com/~sadus