May 17, 2004

• What is the artist's name? If it isn't a common name (John Smith) you might be able to contact the person directly by locating them on Google. Really! I often contact sources that way. If the person isn't too famous, maybe he/she is actually listed in some phone book somewhere.
• Well, it's Tom Waits, which makes things a bit difficult. There are nearly half a million google hits for him, not to mention his famous reclusiveness -- he doesn't even allow interviewers to come to his home, preferring to meet them in diners and junk shops.
• oh lordy. tom waits. well, so much for Switchboard for a home phone number. heh.
• here, you might try this, it's a 14-day free trial of a directory of various agents.
• or contact his label.
• Not to be counter-productive or discouraging, but my organization had tried this before (wishing to incorporate a specific artist's music into a streaming web presentation) and we were turned down promptly. Despite the fact that the artist is a very mediocre and unknown classical performer
• Depends on the artist. Some are very generous to unknowns. When Frank Darabont was still an aspiring filmmaker, he contacted Stephen King about getting the film rights to one of the stories from Night Shift. Story has it that King sold him the rights for a buck, as a way of helping out a novice.
• Small Change got rained on by his own .38
• yoko ono gave a friend of mine rights to the phrase "all we are saying, is give peace a chance" several years ago for a holiday card. so it is possible.
• Yes, of course, still try for those rights, middleclasstool. I just thought it would be helpful to let you know of my personal experience. It's encouraging to hear successful stories, tho'.
• Tom Waits is on an Epitaph subsidiary called "Anti". I'd imagine they'd be a hell of a lot easier to deal with than a major label. Good luck.
• Tom Waits for no man.
• boo, that's actually who I wanna use for the story. Freakish, gritty noir kind of thing. With the lunatic newsboy with stains on his pants, of course.
• Of course it is. Small change makes us all into Raymond Chandler. Lord knows I've got a small cache of pulp fiction based on that album.
• try http://www.copyright.com/
• it's the Copyright Clearance Center
• *hangs head in derivative shame*
• I guess it matters if you are going to have it published, but is derivative art really controlled by the copyright of the original? Doesn't making a kernal of a story into something else make it new art? Or so the author of Life of Pi said after basing his Booker Prize winning novel on a review of a Brazillian book. It's also a question of how much is borrowed from the song. I've borrowed a name from a song, but the story had nothing to do with it (except that two lines of the chorus fit the story). But, of course, I wasn't publishing, so who cares. And I don't know if I would remember the songwriter's name (was briefly on a documentary, very catchy chorus).
• (Derivatve isn't shameful - it's the basis of creation. And the challenge is to make the derivation better than the original).
• Yeah, because I'm a much better writer than that hack Waits. /sarcasm
• If all you wanted to do was perform or record the song, it'd be easy. One would go through the Harry Fox Agency and pay a standard royalty. However, since you're shooting for a derivative work, I believe it will have to be negotiated directly, as others have stated. The Harry Fox FAQ does not address derivative works directly, however. I do expect that they could put you in touch with whomever you needed to speak to get the rights. On the other hand, it might not be worth your while to bother. Fan fiction and whatnot are fairly well established on the Internet, and they certainly aren't paying royalties. Probably the fact that no money changes hands has as much to do with that as anything, though. I've also heard that record labels will only sue for an unauthorized sample if the settlement will be large enough to make it worth thier while. That'a a rumor and a roll of the dice however. If it were me, I'd take the chance and claim Fair Use. On the safe side, I'd get in touch with Harry Fox and see if I could find a law library with a librarian that will help a pro se patron. Many do. Librarians are your friends. Also, I'm not a lawyer even a little bit, most of my legal knowledge is culled from reading rec.audio.pro, which is better than Slashdot, but not much.
• You're not doing a "Tommie the Drunk Piano" comic are you?
• Change the name of the character.