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Spanish Kurt
It is a hard subject with a lot of different legal aspects to it. And with legal stuff involved, we all know there is a big difference between what we all feel is right and what is legally justified. It seems to me Mick Taylor did not read all the small print when he joined the band.

Down the line, the band is a company, not just a couple of cats playing music together. It is not just a matter of enjoying together whatever creative input any person in the band had while recording songs. It is a business affair to sell the products of the band and the chief executives are rewarded higher than those on the work floor, who gave them the ideas for new products. It has always been like that and it will always remain that way.

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Happy24

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Spanish Kurt
It is a hard subject with a lot of different legal aspects to it. And with legal stuff involved, we all know there is a big difference between what we all feel is right and what is legally justified. It seems to me Mick Taylor did not read all the small print when he joined the band.

Down the line, the band is a company, not just a couple of cats playing music together. It is not just a matter of enjoying together whatever creative input any person in the band had while recording songs. It is a business affair to sell the products of the band and the chief executives are rewarded higher than those on the work floor, who gave them the ideas for new products. It has always been like that and it will always remain that way.

Very well said...

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schillid
Then there's recent situation when the keyboardist from Procol Harem suing and winning a share of royalties from "Whiter Shade Of Pale"
because he came up with and playied the signature keyboard lick in that song... He wasn't credited as the songwriter.

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alimente
Even the picture of "Taylor joining the Stones" is a misconception. He did not join them. They hired him, and he never was a full band member in terms of being part of the Stones corporation. He was payed a regurlar wage, just like an employee. He never had any control or say in creative & business decisions.

...He was hired, and payed like an employee, just like the backing musicians (probably a bit more!).

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alimente
Even the picture of "Taylor joining the Stones" is a misconception. He did not join them. They hired him, and he never was a full band member in terms of being part of the Stones corporation. He was payed a regurlar wage, just like an employee. He never had any control or say in creative & business decisions.

...He was hired, and payed like an employee, just like the backing musicians (probably a bit more!).

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Smokey
This was true at the outset, but what is your source for this statement as it applies to his entire career with the Stones?

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liddas
Why is this songwriting credits thing so difficult to understand?

There is (was) an agreement between the members of the group on how to share the profits of the "rolling stones corporation". In force of this agreement no matter who wrote what, Jagger / Richards are credited for lyrics and music and receive the related royalties.

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alimente

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Happy24

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Spanish Kurt
It is a hard subject with a lot of different legal aspects to it. And with legal stuff involved, we all know there is a big difference between what we all feel is right and what is legally justified. It seems to me Mick Taylor did not read all the small print when he joined the band.

That is because there was no small print at that point for him to read.
At the end of the '69 tour one of their main concerns was to escape from the claws of Allen Klein. It took them several years to get out of that legal entanglement.

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Spanish Kurt
Down the line, the band is a company, not just a couple of cats playing music together. It is not just a matter of enjoying together whatever creative input any person in the band had while recording songs. It is a business affair to sell the products of the band and the chief executives are rewarded higher than those on the work floor...

<snap>

Not long after Taylor joined they decided it was time to take control of things by forming their own business (to prevent another A. Klein type situation). The five bandmembers became in fact the company directors, or CEO's if you like. They had equal rights, so you can't really use the "chief executives and work floor" analogy here.

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alimente
Very well said, indeed.

When Taylor "joined" the Stones, he agreed to certain terms & conditions, just like any other employee in any other corporation.

Except that they were still to put these terms & conditions down in writing for their company themselves. This did not happen until 1970.
The Stones at the end of 1969 were in a bit of a pickle, hadn't toured for years, had allowed A. Klein to take advantage of the situation - which turned out to be a very expensive mistake. By the end of that year they discovered there would be a gigantic tax bill (regarding past earnings) waiting for them the next year, which in effect meant they were on the brink of bankruptcy !
It was only when they were smart enough to form their own business stucture (with Taylor onboard) that things started heading in the right direction again.
In 1970 Taylor helped to define the "terms and conditions", he did not just sign his name on the dotted line when he joined.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2008-07-16 18:19 by Lightnin'.

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john lomax
The way it works with songwriting credits is that the person/people who wrote the words and the melody are the songwriters. The fact that Taylor or Wyman or Watts may have played on the recording and added something interesting is irrelevant - from a musical perspective what they are doing simply counts as part of the arrangement, it does not entitle them to claim a writer's credit. Therefore, the fact that Taylor may have been playing some intersting chords or licks is irrelevant - the person who gets the songwriting credit is the person who writes the melody and the lyrics, ie Mick and Keith. I think the payments that were made to Taylor for some of the guitar work on Tatto You was not to give songwriting credit, but to merely pay him for having played on a best-selling album.

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Amsterdamned
When does a musicion clam the songwriting?
I cannot imagine KR,or MJ or MT,RW,or even BW & CW ran into the studio
and say:"here is the song,here is the leed sheet,just play this and shut the ****
up.

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Lightnin'

No agreement like that exists in the Rolling Stones, nor has it ever existed. So I'm afraid the rest of your argument lacks a solid foundation.

The five bandmembers Mick J, Mick T, Keith R, Charlie W and Bill W formed their own business structure in 1970 after they fired A. Klein - the documents they signed at that point stipulate where the profits from the different sources of income go, like touring, merchandise or artist royalties. In most cases it is split equally between the five directors. Songwriting is a separate issue, legal regulations require that the publishing royalties (a percentage of the retail price per CD) are collected by a publishing company (in this case Promopub in Amsterdam) and then distributed to the authors of the compositions.

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alimente


That's the reason why Mick Jagger turned pale and Keith Richards got angry when Taylor told them he quit
Because he was hired and not a member.

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Mathijs

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Amsterdamned
When does a musicion clam the songwriting?
I cannot imagine KR,or MJ or MT,RW,or even BW & CW ran into the studio
and say:"here is the song,here is the leed sheet,just play this and shut the ****
up.

Er...this is basically how it happens within the Stones. For every record Keith has written a couple, Jagger has written a couple, and the rest they wrote together. From the bootlegs that are available you can hear that most songs are fairly finished when presented to the band: a verse, a chorus, an instrumental break. The melody is there, most of the time parts of the lyrics as well. Then the song is rehearsed over and over again, and this is where each member adds his own flavor. A solo here, a riff there, some magic bass by Bill etc.

Mathijs

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alimente
Even the picture of "Taylor joining the Stones" is a misconception. He did not join them. They hired him, and he never was a full band member in terms of being part of the Stones corporation. [a list of many false assumptions follows - edited out here]

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Amsterdamned
That's the reason why Mick Jagger turned pale and Keith Richards got angry when Taylor told them he quit
Because he was hired and not a member.

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Mathijs
For history sakes: taylor was not a hired gun, he was made full member after the '69 tour, much to his own surprise.

Mathijs

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Lightnin'

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alimente
Even the picture of "Taylor joining the Stones" is a misconception. He did not join them. They hired him, and he never was a full band member in terms of being part of the Stones corporation. [a list of many false assumptions follows - edited out here]

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Amsterdamned
That's the reason why Mick Jagger turned pale and Keith Richards got angry when Taylor told them he quit
Because he was hired and not a member.

Sigh... Amsterdamned, I don't want to repeat everything I already explained above, so please scroll to 9, 8 and 6 posts up and read this carefully. Taylor was not only a full member but was also a director in each of the companies they founded (based since 1970 in Amsterdam) - Jagger, Taylor, Richards, Watts and Wyman all had exactly the same rights.
The statements made in this thread that some bandmembers would be higher up in the ranking order than others (chief executives vs only employees) are total poppycock.[/quote

Sigh Mathijs:
That was what I was meaning,my remark was ment ironic..is that sow hard to understand?
Ofcourse I don't buy his story about Taylor.

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bumbum
Read the article and you will see that Mick J and Mick T wrote quite many songs in the beginning af the 70'ies without Keith (Keith was too drugged):

[www.iorr.org]

also that Billy and Mick wrote Miss You while Keith was in Toronto for his heroin problems.

Let's get Mick T back.

Mick suggest that probably the main reason for Mick T leaving was the lack of understanding between Mick T and Keith