question from a Taxi newbie

[songwriter7373]

I guess the biggest benefit is time.
They get the tunes "out there" so to speak... on all the digital sites (iTunes, amazon, Spotify, etc..)
And they registered me with ascap and keep track of sales and collect money for me.
So the biggest benefit is me not having to spend the time doing that all on my own.

[ochaim]

I hear you.

registering your songs with a pro is relatively painless. and you dont need to register your songs with foreign pro's. there are reciprocal agreements in place for money to be collected on a writer's behalf if the royalties are generated outside of the writer's home country.

that is if your goal is licensing music rather than sales/streaming.

although i dont think you have to opt into the pub admin deal to get the royalties generated from sales/streaming. tunecore/cdbaby already do that dont they? like mechanical royalties.

i just cant find a good reason to sign a pub admin deal with either company.

[Russell Landwehr]

I guess the biggest benefit is time.
They get the tunes "out there" so to speak... on all the digital sites (iTunes, amazon, Spotify, etc..)
And they registered me with ascap and keep track of sales and collect money for me.
So the biggest benefit is me not having to spend the time doing that all on my own.

So, have you thought about the headache there is going to be if you sign those songs to a Library? With the same title? Changing the Publisher portion can be a hassle.

[mojobone]

This is really more a Biz question, but if the moderators move it, your links will still work, so no biggie.

Yes, there are music libraries that won't take anything that's with Tunecore, (not all of them) but there are other kinds of opportunities where self-publishing or co-publishing can be to your advantage; if you score (pun intended) that big advertising gig, it would behoove you to have your track in the iTunes store (and on Spotify, Deezer, Rdio, Tidal and Pandora before the campaign launch, for one example.

[randonpurcell]

So, when it comes to cues I submit through Taxi, I don't sell them or release them on iTunes, CD Baby, etc... I just use Taxi and Soundcloud.

When it comes to full songs, EDM instrumentals or lyrical tracks, I tend to sell those as albums, which I release on CD, iTunes, CD Baby etc. However, I never sign up for CD Baby Pro licensing.

I believe there are some libraries that won't work with songs that are on iTunes, but the few libraries I've got tracks with do not have a problem with it, as long as it is just there for sale and not sync licensing.

In the end, it really all comes down to the library owner. But in my opinion, if you have it up for sale and DO NOT have sync licensing enabled, you should be able to pitch them through Taxi. If they get forwarded and the licensing house has a problem with it, you could always go pull it off the digital shelves easily enough.

[mojobone]

True. Occasionally you run into the situation where you're pitching to a major artist and maybe they want a piece of the publishing in exchange for the cut. In that somewhat unlikely event, you're hamstrung, if the song has already been published. The trick is to pitch your stuff everywhere, 'til you're reasonably certain no one else will sign/release it, then if you STILL think its release will enhance your career-put it out yourself.