Is DJ'ing music from blogs legal?

DJ Life & Community General Discussion
21

Ehh, i don’t know if you guys follow a lot of EDM artists, but the majority of them couldn’t give less of a shit whether you pay for their music or not as they make most of their money from shows and most record labels in the EDM industry are owned/foudned by EDM artists, still making huge bucks from shows.

IMo, if it’s an unpaid gig and it’s a house party/whatever, who cares, play whatever. If it’s a paid gig, where usually in the EDM scene you aren’t on for that long since it’s usually a line up, pay for the music. It really won’t be much if your set is 90 minutes MAX.

22

I disagree if it is an up and coming producer, my best mate has just quit his job because he is seeing a return from selling his tracks… that means more time producing and better tracks, simple as that. it doesn’t matter to anyone getting 4 or more figures per show, but guys breaking out of their local scene getting 3 figures it is very important to…

23

So WRONG!!! I bet 99.9% of every person making music would like to be paid for their art. I can safely say all the people I know who do it wish they could do it full time BUT because of the shortsighted mentality of people who would make the above statement most of them have to have “day Jobs” because it’s OK to steal the music it it’s “just for a house party” Sorry Bro, Just plain wrong.

24

Then that’s an issue with the record label, not the artists. Artists see something like 4 cents per track sold, the rest is eaten up by the label. don’t believe me? Ask the ridiculous amount of average to mediocre to shit producers getting signed by no name labels off that shithole that soundcloud has become that is consistently lowering the bar for what is acceptable quality in electronic music.

But this is very strictly speaking EDM, I can’t speak for other genres.

nobody isn’t getting paid for their music, or isn’t getting “big” because of small-time piracy, that’s simply untrue.

25

from what i know in the hip hop industry when i almost got signed by UGK West you might get a signing bonus from the record lable but thats possible the only money you would ever really make from the label. they do eat up most of the record sale profits and real money made is through touring and shows and such.

26

I mean, I really have to agree with what Bassnectar says in his DJTT interview:

"But then again, i do not know how essential new DJs are. And that is a crumby thing to say, especially concerning the fact that i am a very inclusive and community oriented person, AND have taught DJ and Remix classes and workshops for years. I want to support anyone do anything and everything they want, ideally. It’s a loaded topic that deserves a lot of explanation in order to clearly establish the point, but i just think there is a level of saturation of both DJs and producers these days that its become very obligatory and unstimulating."

There are so many “upcoming producers” that are really not up to par getting signed. first things first I probably wouldn’t pay for or “pirate” their music to begin with. Truly talented upcoming producers are needle in a haystack these days, and forcing people to pay for this music and really cracking down on piracy of it will only inflame this issue. If producers and good enough to be getting gigs, they should be getting paid, and they are.

27

Just to throw this out there, I got a response from the owner and designer of Dub-Level a few hours ago. Apparently its a publicity thing between the artists and him. If what he is saying is completely true.

Me-
“Hey I am a DJ in the central FL area. First let me start by saying I love Dub-Level. I have archives of your music back to November 2010. I am just sort of concerned with the legalities of your site. How is it you can provide free music (with copyright laws cracking down on DJs and all) I would really like to know if your site is legit & legal or not? Thank you”

Owner-
“Well a lot of our tracks come from the artists them selves. We are getting more and more connections with artists the more we grow. Second the big artists such as skrillex, deadmau5 and others love having any promotion they can get. They honestly couldn’t care less. Though if an artists wants a tune taken down, we will do it as quickly as possible since we respect what they want. Though ever since the beginning we have never had any artists wanting to take anything down. -Daniel”

Thoughts on this?

28

wow he actually talked to you, thats a trip… but he’s saying things that sound legit haha, but like what big time artist is gonna scour the internet looking for every blog/site giving away his music and tell them to stop it. as mentioned before they are “big time” they got bigger fish to fry than some “small time” blog/site

29

Srsly, what did you think the answer would be? Should he say “yeah dude, it’s all illegal”?

Btw, another big advantage of actually buying your mp3s (or whatever file format you choose) ist the fact that you don’t clutter your harddrive with mediocre tracks (or at least not nearly as much, sure a couple still slip through the net, but it’s more rare), so your music collection is more managable and ultimately better.

30

And quality. Don’t forget that a lot of blog tracks are 192 or under.

31

Are you making random shit up or going off what a mate of a mate of a mate told you.

Do your research before you so boldly state such a thing.

General label deal between artist and label is 50/50 artist/label through most genres; different deals depend on remixes/videos/artwork/promo but this is only for bigger tracks which are worth that investment.

I know hundreds of artists, myself included, who make thousands of pounds a year from production. As for your pop at Soundcloud, it’s not advertised as a place where they run quality control - its a facebook for musicians, don’t like it - stay off it please.

32

Whatever he’s going to tell you most of it is still pirated music. It looks like a lot of it is unauthorized remixes which are technically illegal too but people don’t seem to have as big a moral issue with people giving them away.

I’m not sure what you’re looking for us to tell you here, this is more a personal ethics thing than a legality thing and not a lot of people on here will straight up tell you to go ahead and use it and the truth is I’m sure the vast majority of people on this forum DJ with at least some pirated music in their collection whether they will publicly admit it or not. It’s the rare exception where someone has a library with all songs bought and paid for and no unauthorized remixes.

33

I’m not looking for anymore answers, I’ve already made my decision morally. Most of you guys have given me enough solid information to make the decision to keep my library bought and paid for 100%. I was really just asking your thoughts on the response, kind of adding information to the debate Xone.

34

Ok, I respect the rules on this forum, and my intention is FAR from promoting music piracy, that is an illegal act.

But even a murderer has a lawyer to defend him, so I’ll try to write some points that defend piracy (it’s not the same thing as encouraging, a murderer’s lawyer is not an accomplice)

• Support the artist ? Lmao. Let’s take a track that is $2 on Beatport.com. 50% goes to beatport. And depending on the label/artist it’s like what ? 70/30, 60/40 at best ? So yeah, every track that is sold, the artist earns $0.30.
I don’t know about minimium monthly salary in the US, but in France it’s like $1,438.91, which is a pretty low standard of living.
It represents 4,000 sales of the track per month, which is pretty huge, and thus never reached by “normal” artists.

Given that fact, artists, that still need to eat and sleep in a decent accomodation, raised the fees for shows. (I can’t find any decent graph to back this but if you sometimes go at events and stuff, you know that’s true.)
Now, they earn money thanks to shows, and not from beatport, itunes and stuff. That’s just plain bonus.

I’m ok with that, it supports the artist, and it creates kind of an enterprise spirit, an artistic movement. That’s 100% better than guys going like 1 or 2 CDs that became famous, and then just lay back in a couch for the rest of their lives.

• Promotion promotion.

If you have talent, and love what you create, you want to spread the world, right ?
Do you have any single idea how expensive advertisement is ? (and i’m only talking about internet ads).
If you don’t, still you must agree that it’s way more expensive than anything a guy would earn through beatport or iTunes.

Therefore, word of mouth is the best marketing plan you can ever dream of. This is the #1 solution to spread your talent over the world, and it doesn’t cost you a single cent.
Having your track available for free is the best way to end up on every single iPod in town, then country, then world. It’s the best way to build a fan base, that heard about you and your talent because one of their friends had your track, illegally downloaded, on his iPod.
If you make it through, enjoy the parties, hotels, alcohol, b*tches and stuff.

About the second point, I see you coming at me. I only talked about young talents that have to make it in the industry. What about superstars that also have their music downloaded illegally ?
My reply would be : Do you know how much Steve Angello charges for a pre-recorded set ? Doing nothing, playing tracks that are not of his work ? (i’m not questioning DJing, i’m refering to Knas.)
Ok, I guess we agree on that one.

To conclude, let me repeat that my aim is not to promote piracy, that is an illegal act in most of our countries.
Still, everything has to be said in a debate.

35

Prior to 2003 monthly track budget was close to a grand now days I’m lucky if I burn through 300 bucks a month on beat port.

Be thankful your not buying vinyl where you maybe paying 20bucks for one good mix and now can pay a buck for that one good mix.

Paying for music is like paying for gas if you want to dj buy the tracks if you wan to drive buy your gas.

Also a lot of very good tracks can be found on production forums and soundcloud you would be surprised how much free legal music is there.

I’ve paid a dollar for a track only to see the artist had it posted on soundcloud for free

36

For sure. And I think it’s a great idea to promote yourself. However, if the music available for free on soundcloud was able to entierly satisfy the needs DJs/listeners, piracy wouldn’t exist.

37

Does that really work ? At all ?
Even if ask a very local, yet (for his niche audience) very successful producer/DJ ?
(For example Brownz, he’s 17, but is amongst the top 5 Belgian dubstep producers, he even has a video clip under his belt, and has a lot of stuff on beatport. He lives less then 20 km from me and plays a lot at gigs in his hometown that I go to, I even shared a “cigarette” with that guy, but I think he would cold blooded deny me a free .wav or 320.)

Or what kind of guy did you have in mind that gives out free tracks to a select few that ask for them ?

Not exactly the same but one guy begged for a free 320 on Badklaat’s soundcloud begged because he didn’t have a means of online payment and Badklaat laughed in his face. Virtually that is.

Isn’t reaching the same level of fame a requirement for these things to happen ? If not it would be awesome but I doubt it.

38

I’m going off of screenshots of beatport artists that i have seen posted on facebook. It’s very low.

Thousands of pounds a year? That’s pretty impressive. Assuming you meant plural, at minimum 2000 pounds, so about 3000 dollars minimum.

Damn, so you rock sales of 6000+ tracks per year? That’s damn good, assuming that’s not exaggerated.

Yeah I stay away from it, it’s killing EDM. Horribly.

39

Piracy is easier the being an active member on production forums and soundcloud.

40

I can’t tell you the amount of tracks I’ve been able to get by just watching production area on forums and then a few months later hear a big name play the track and go hmmz I know that track and sure enough it’s one I’ve got for free Really get on some of the big production forums and you’d be surprised what gems you find