Posted by Mr. Chirps on March 11, 2009 at 15:57:55:
Did any of you nerds see this?
March 10, 2009
BY JIM DeROGATIS Pop Music Critic
Radio should be paying performers more for the songs it plays, Smashing Pumpkins bandleader Billy Corgan told congressional leaders today during a hearing on the Performance Rights Act before the House Committee on the Judiciary.
Pushed by the major label?s lobbying group, bills have been introduced to both houses of Congress to require conventional or ?terrestrial? radio to pay musicians for playing on recordings given airtime. Radio has long paid royalties to the songwriters, but it has not paid separate performance royalties, which have been required of Internet, television satellite broadcasters.
?The change to the law we are here to discuss only redresses an outmoded, unfair practice that favors one participant?s [radio?s] needs over another [performers?]. This legislation is simply a form of restoration to artists long overdue,? Corgan said.
But rather than demanding more royalties from conventional radio, many music advocates say performance royalties should be waived for all broadcasters, since playing a song on any medium essentially is a free ad that may boost sales of that recording.
If the changes in the law pass, ?your local radio stations will be forced to cut services or employees, may be forced to move from a music format to a talk format or may be facing bankruptcy,? NAB Radio Board Chairman Steve Newberry told the committee.
Traditional radio was for years allowed to coast along without paying performance royalties under the labels' reasoning that playing a song on the radio was, in effect, a paid commercial for the song and the artist. But times have changed, conventional radio no longer has the juice it once had and many performers and labels are now hungering for that extra piece of the pie.