ROYALTY FREE SAMPLES

[alek]

Hi there,
who had an experience good or bad one with royalty free samples? What is it for those who
doesn't know what I talk about: go to

http://www.producerloops.com/

and you'll find there tons of CONSTRUCTION KITS produced by multiple manufacturers in
various genres. Some of them are just GREAT! Using them could save a lot of your time and efforts cuz they are well produced and mixed - just add something (instruments, vocals)
and your song is ready.
So, would love to hear of a someone's experience with placements of a stuff built on them.

[sguiles]

*Bump*

I'm also curious what other's people's experiences are with this.
I know there are many times when listings specifically mention NOT using samples, but I wonder what the legality of using a royalty-free sample would be? Basically all the loops and drums in Garageband are royalty-free, correct?

Just wondering. Good question!

[fusilierb]

I think you have to read the fine print on what the particular library you are using allows you to do with their creations. To be totally legal, you have to abid by that. To be totally a creative musician, why would you possibly consider yourself an original creator of a piece if you didn't create it?

[alek]

I think you have to read the fine print on what the particular library you are using allows you to do with their creations. To be totally legal, you have to abid by that. To be totally a creative musician, why would you possibly consider yourself an original creator of a piece if you didn't create it?

I. I read everything they write in agreement provided to each package of their kits.
2. If you hired session musicians, do they own your song, once they got paid? The same thing with construction kits - once I bought them as "royalty free" then I do what I want with them
with the one exception: I can't sell them unmodified, i.e. I should add other instruments, vocals, then it's done.

[cardell]

I think there's a place for this. It seems to depend on the genre...somewhat.

Stuart

[Len911]

My understanding of royalty free samples is that they become illegal if you make them available as samples to others, in competition, whether modified or not. They are only for use in compositions, and technically only the compositions of the license holder.

I think your premise is a little misguided if you think that all you have to do is add a vocal or instrument. I agree samples and loops sound great. Imo it's actually more difficult than using live players for most situations. Live players can adapt to the prosidic elements more quickly. This is only my opinion, thought and theory. Songs have their own rhythm, but they also have a prosidic (prosody) rhythm that is contained in the melody. The rhythm of the melody (prosody) has to be in "harmony" with the song rhythm.
The purest method to write a song is to begin with a unified lyric/melody/prosody or in the case of an instrumental, melody/prosody. This determines your harmony or chord progression and rhythm. Beginning with a chord progression and rhythm first is actually probably more difficult, because you must find a suitable melody/prosody that not only fits but makes sense. A tell-tale sign of a chord progression before melody/prosody, is a lyric that is strangely accented, rushed words, mispronounciations, generally poor prosody.
An extreme example of poor prosody are those computer programs that can read text.
Yes, you may just add a vocal or instrument and have a song, but how convincing and how satisfying the song is, is the real determining factor. Realistically, if "hit" songs could be constructed without much more effort after the loop makers made their arrangements, they wouldn't sell them.
If there is any magical ingredient to a song, imo it is the prosody, even though it is generally considered a linguistic term.
I'm not at all saying that loops and samples and prearranged and recorded "backing" tracks can't be useful or desirable, or even that it's not "your own" material, I do think it is in most cases more challenging, and that the "selling points" are quite deceiving.

[simonparker]

Len is correct for the major websites that sell royalty free loops/construction kits. You cannot buy samples/loops from these sites and then turn around and post them on your own website and sell to others.

But let's take it a step back and think about what Royalty free samples really means.

Yes, you can add your own instruments to these samples or loops and incorporate them into songs. It's been done by some of the major websites that boast producers Stargate uses their samples. Jason Derulo has loops and samples from one site in his hit songs. Etc. etc. We get it. People in Sweden (where else do all the cool sounds come from, the USA? ha ha ha says Max Martin) put together beats and sounds and DJs/producers using Fruity Loops or other sampler programs are constructing music from it.

But here's the issue of today's tracks via loops and samples and the way it used to be. It used to be one person or a songwriting team put together a song on piano and guitar with lyrics and recorded it. It went something like this...Old school songwriter goes into his bedroom and takes guitar with him while parents watch TV downstairs in living room. Old school songwriter strings together a G chord, a C, and a D, and writes a hit song. S/he takes his 4 track recorder, puts a click track on it and creates a scratch track from newly written song. S/He takes scratch track to local studio, hires musicians and awesome singer and they put together his/her creation. His/her song is sent to Madonna who loves it and record it. Old school songwriter makes money.

New school songwriter works with 3 other new school songwriters via the web, by taking beats from construction kits they have, adds a little keyboard section through Reason 5.0, and viola, there's the track. The 4 writers send track to big time producer who likes it and decides to add a filter to the track (and works in top notch studio) to bake the sound on the track. Top notch producer gets songwriter credit for his baking. Producer then brings musical track created from loops and baked in a studio to new talent signed to major label who does top line and vocals on it and also takes a songwriter credit. Then singer realizes a couple of verses are whack. Singer goes back to top notch producer asking for help. Producer brings in 3 lyric writers to help on the verses. Before you know it, you've got like 9 people writing a hit song that started out in some Swedish guys basement.

The issue is when was the music part of the song really created? Did the song get created musically by the Swedish guy who chose to sell the sound via loops/samples royalty free or was it created by the kids who bought the loops from the Swedish guy through an online Royalty free samples store? What about the producer who layers in other sounds, filters, sweeps, new keyboard parts, samples, etc.?

Does the starting point of a hit song begin with the person who put together the riffs or sounds that are being looped or with the kids who bought the music and constructed a royalty free loop into a royalty loop? Or the producer whose tools in the studio make it sonically fit? Or was it the topline melody the singer created that made it a song versus a bunch of chords being put together?

Oh yes, royalty free music and loops. It used to be much easier just putting together a song with a guitar.

[sguiles]

I think you have to read the fine print on what the particular library you are using allows you to do with their creations. To be totally legal, you have to abid by that. To be totally a creative musician, why would you possibly consider yourself an original creator of a piece if you didn't create it?

I think you can be very original AND creative and use loops. Look at Beck, Radiohead, and a myriad of other very creative artists. A large part of rap and hiphop are loop and sample based to create the track. Those sounds are very important and make the song what it is and what people remember.

It's just a new set of tools, imho, that creative people are using to create music. It used to be just a guitar and a piano. Now it's a guitar, piano, and a computer.

[alek]

Realistically, if "hit" songs could be constructed without much more effort after the loop makers made their arrangements, they wouldn't sell them.

simonparker put some real points on this, mentioning Stargate, I could add that
In 2009, both Beyoncé and Kelly Clarkson had hits (Beyoncé’s “Halo,” which charted in April, and Clarkson’s “Already Gone,” which charted in August) that were created from the same track, by Ryan Tedder. Cool?
To know how it works, read this article about Stargate:
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012 ... t_seabrook

As for me, I use both ways - old fashioned, an this is my latest song that born this way:

http://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=11734100 male vocals

and this one:

http://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=11492246 Urban beat

you'll hear just a beat, but it has already it's own history:
one song was written over my beat, but promoter declined it, but about a beat itself he said:
"...this is a great beat and I wouldn't sell it even for $5000 alone as it is with no vocals"
I used several different construction kits to build it plus added horns, strings legato/pizzicato and guitar.
But everybody teaches me about things that I knew already a while ago, and nobody tells
about how real placements with samples work.