New Music Industry Watch original article, unauthorized refusal to reprint
Author | Billions of humble
If one day you find out on the music APP that a band called Yu Ding Shi released the song "Little Love Song", singing exactly like Soda Green, please don't be surprised.
The Band of Fish Ding Yu held a press conference a few days ago, at which in addition to announcing that it would hold a concert in February next year, it also announced a "replica plan": re-recording and releasing an old album of Soda Green.
Wu Qingfeng, the lead singer of the band Yuding Ito, also announced the news on Weibo.
However, for this "fork plan", the band did not disclose too many details, at the press conference, when asked about the matter, Wu Qingfeng replied: "Similar to Taylor Swift, go listen to her song to know." ”
Why did Yu Ding Ito do this? Why does Wu Qingfeng say "similar to Taylor Swift"? Will this "fork project" succeed?
In September this year, Yu Ding Ito released the band's debut album "Ikedo Strange Talk". Friends who are familiar with the inside story know that Yu Ding Ito is not a new band, the band members are from soda green, and the three words "Fish Ding Yu" are disassembled from the traditional "soda green".
The reason why there is "Fish Ding Ito" is because the trademark of "Soda Green" is currently owned by the band's former manager Lin Weizhe, and the two sides parted ways due to copyright disputes, but the band cannot continue its acting career under the name of "Soda Green" for the time being.
Looking through the relevant materials, from the analysis of some legal people, Lin Weizhe's holding of the "Soda Green" trademark has been recognized by the court, and the band cannot retrieve the right to use the trademark in the short term, so it can only launch a "reproduction plan" to re-record the old songs.
From Wu Qingfeng's words at the press conference, what we heard was that the re-recorded album should be released in the name of "Fish Ding", and each album would be a double CD package, which means "doubling the return".
When it comes to re-recording old songs, Wu Qingfeng said that it doesn't feel much different from before, because it has always been six people creating and arranging music together, so everyone wants to restore the past practice as much as possible. It's just that there will be some small modifications, "with our current mentality to make the things that were a little regrettable before better." “
But Wu Qingfeng also said that the re-recorded album "will be more human" because, "I can hear that this person seems to have experienced some stories." ”
Soda Green, who became a soldier in 2001, officially debuted in 2004, this year is the 20th anniversary of the band's founding, and the official debut is the 17th anniversary. In the past 17 years, Soda Green has attracted a large number of fans with its excellent works and unique temperament.
In 2017, Soda Green group rested, and subsequently, the band fell into a copyright dispute between former manager Lin Weizhe, who sued Wu Qingfeng and other infringements, but was repeatedly rejected by the court.
On September 1 this year, Lin Weizhe, who has repeatedly failed, announced that he would no longer appeal and withdrew all litigation applications, and said that "I don't want anything", the copyright dispute has finally come to an end, but the trademark dispute is still continuing, and legal sources have analyzed that it is difficult for the band to return the "soda green" trademark in the short term.
So there was the "replica plan" of Yu Ding Ito.
In mid-November, Taylor Swift released her second re-album, Red (Taylor's Version). At the press conference, it is inevitable that the reporter will mention this matter.
Wu Qingfeng replied, "It's similar to Taylor Swift, just listen to her songs." "He's joking," he didn't expect to be preempted by Taylor Swift. ”
Jokes aside, but if you want to learn about Yuding's "replica plan", you really have to talk about Taylor Swift's re-recording album.
Some friends in the industry believe that in a strict sense, the "reproduction" in the "reproduction plan" is not very scientific, because the "reproduction" usually refers to Remaster, mastering remake, only adjusting the mastering, not re-recording, "reproduction plan" is not Remaster, but Re-record, re-recording production.
What is the significance of re-recording production? It is to obtain the copyright of the recording of the work.
The copyright of a sound recording work is mainly divided into two parts, the songwriting copyright and the recording copyright, the songwriting copyright belongs to the creator, and the recording copyright belongs to the investor, which is simply who pays for the recording and who owns the recording copyright.
In the record industry, the main body of investment is the record company, so the recording copyright is generally owned by the record company, and the singer and the creator can get a certain percentage of the royalties. This model, which has been used for many years, has also caused a lot of controversy.
In The case of Taylor Swift, the six albums she released in her early years were recorded and distributed by the record label Big Machine, and the recording rights belonged to the big machine records, and Taylor Swift received up to 28% royalties.
Taylor Swift tried to buy back the recording rights, but was harassed by big machine records and asked her to exchange it for a new album. After the contract expired, Taylor Swift's recording rights fell into the hands of others because of the sale of the big machine records.
So Taylor Swift decided to rerun the old album.
The advantage of re-recording old albums is that they can control the recording copyright themselves, because in the current industrial environment, the value of recording copyright is much higher than the songwriting copyright.
Take Universal Music, for example. Universal Music Group is divided into two main business lines, one is recorded music business (Recorded), one is songwriting copyright business (Publishing), recording copyright is attributed to the recording music business line, Universal Music Group recently released financial reports show that in the first nine months of this year, Universal Music recorded music business revenue of 4.85 billion euros, songwriting copyright business is 930 million euros, a difference of more than 5 times.
In the royalty distribution of a sound recording, the distribution of songwriting royalties is generally 5-8%.
Therefore, Taylor Swift will emphasize that musicians must strive to master the copyright of their own recordings.
In a reasonable treaty, the copyright of sound recordings has a fixed term of protection, after which musicians can re-record past albums. According to foreign media, in The case of Taylor Swift, the protection period is five years, and the albums before "Reputation" have passed the protection period, plus Taylor Swift has always held the songwriting copyright herself, so she can choose to re-record the album.
The case of Soda Green is similar to Thatyler Swift, soda green has released albums in the past, the recording copyright belongs to Lin Weizhe Music Society, fortunately, the songwriting copyright won, Yu Ding Yu was able to re-record his old songs.
Taylor Swift's re-albums have been hugely successful, and the two re-albums that have been released so far, Fearless (Taylor's Version) and "Red (Taylor's Version)", are both commercial and word-of-mouth.
From the works re-recorded by Taylor Swift, the singing and arrangement have not changed much, but because after years of tempering, the technique is more mature, so the effect of re-recording is also very good.
Then again, in the recording industry, there are very few cases of re-recording albums, and the singer who re-recorded the entire album before Taylor Swift was only JoJo who was slightly famous. In addition, the band Def Leppard has also re-recorded some singles.
"Re-recording" means going through all the recording and production processes all over again, which is a very time-consuming and laborious thing for musicians. Even if it is copied as it is, singers and musicians may not be able to find the feeling of the past, after all, after so many years, the singer's voice state is different from before, and the musician is the same.
So, when Taylor Swift announced that he was going to re-record the album, there was no shortage of doubts in the industry, after all, after all, after so many years, can re-recording old songs still sing the taste of the past?
Taylor Swift reassured all concerns with his real work, because of his excellent work and skills, and his current state is perfect, so the re-recording album works well.
At present, if the re-recording album is to be successful, it needs at least three conditions:
First, the artist itself has a certain degree of popularity and can guarantee the income. Re-recording albums also need costs, if you can't guarantee the return of the original, re-recording will be in vain; second, the artists themselves should be in a relatively good state, especially the voice can not be too different from the past; third, the songwriting is best to be personal original, otherwise, the cost of obtaining songwriting rights is too high, which will affect the progress of the project.
Taylor Swift is able to release two re-recording albums a year because, first of all, the lyrics are mainly her own creation, she is very familiar with the original, and the re-recording is familiar; secondly, she is currently in good shape and can control the albums that have been selected to be re-recorded; of course, with Taylor Swift's current fame, she has enough resources and conditions to ensure the successful completion of the re-recording album and income.
Still, it's much less famous than Taylor Swift's JoJo's re-album released in 2018, and it also has a decent track record on streaming.
The red line is a re-recorded version
Judging from the situation revealed by Wu Qingfeng, there is no technical problem in re-recording old songs, and several works have been re-recorded.
As Wu Qingfeng said, Soda Green's past albums were composed and arranged by six members of the band, so the band is very familiar with the work itself, plus, what is valuable is that after so many years, the feelings of the six members are still the same, and the cooperation is still very tacit. Moreover, Yu Ding's recently released album "Pond Strange Talk" also proves that the band is not only in good shape, but also more mature in skills, which will help the band record old songs better.
For fans of Soda Green, even if the re-recorded album is not under the name "Soda Green", there is no problem, because it is clear to everyone that what is truly unique is not a certain name, but what the six people do together, no matter what they are called.
But the significance of re-recording may go far beyond the work itself, it is not only a record, but also a container of memory and an emotional bond, a common memory established by artists and audiences over the years, because the "re-recording" thing is firmly tied together, and thus gives more emotional value to the record.
Speaking of Taylor Swift, "Red (Taylor's Version)" features a 10-minute version of "All Too Well," a new version of the song that has received critical acclaim and audience acclaim.
Many listeners have reported that listening to the 10-minute version of "All Too Well" heard too many memories, and various emotions came to mind with the song, which is also one of the important values of re-recording - re-recording is not only a record, but also a memory, which is the source of a private emotion between the artist and the listener.
For musicians, being able to overcome difficulties and complete the "re-recording" according to their own ideas is already a success.
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