Could you "retire" off of royalties from one hit song?

I do remember an interview with Rick Danko in the 90s where he'd got a couple of cheques for 100k off video sales of Absolutely Fabulous which had This Wheels On Fire as its theme tune.

 

My favorite is the Puffy story. I do not know if this is true but there is a persistent rumor that the reason Sean Combs always popped up in his artists songs going 'Unh!' or 'Yeah' was so that he could claim a songwriting credit for doing so. Pretty funny if true. Those are some expensive grunts!

 

Slade's manager Chas Chandler (died 1995) claimed to have made $5M out of the band

 

For those who don't know, "Lowdown" is the song Travolta actually danced to during filming. The Bee Gees were dubbed over the footage in editing.

 

Phil Spector was the king of free rides. Barry/Greenwich or Mann/Weil on the A side, but some studio jam on the flip.

 

I guess I missed that 1, probably didn't think to look because I've never heard of it.

 

Yes, this has always interested me, because the most played version of Suicide is Painless is the instrumental - which obviously doesn't use the lyrics, but a cowrite is a cowrite and both the composer and lyricist are paid even when an instrumental version is used.

 

I heard that Burton Cummings stated that every time you hear a Guess Who (or solo Burton Cummings) on the radio he gets a nickel. Now multiply that by the number of stations in a single market that would play one (or more) of these songs and multiply that by the number of markets that would play that once or more per day and multiply that by the number of days in a year and it quickly adds up for a big hit.

 

The rumor that Lowe made $12M out of The Bodyguard has been around for years. Lowe has denied he made anywhere near that much.

 

Slade paid up to 90% in tax at times, and only two members of the band receive royalties for the xmas hit - up to £250,000 each year.

 

This is why Gene Roddenberry added his stupid, never sung lyrics to the Star Trek theme ("There's a star girl waiting for meeeee..."), so he could rip off composer Alexander Courage for half the writers money..

 

Another source of income is having your song parodied by Weird Al Yankovic. Even though legally he doesn't have to, Al splits the royalties for each song he parodies with the original artist. Chamillionaire probably made more from Al's parody White and Nerdy and he did from the original song Ridin'.

 

Not sure what point you're trying to make.

Did the band pay the 90% tax? Or did they happen to be around during the 90% tax era? Did they shelter their income like Macca?

This tax rate is how Allan Klein was able to get his hands on the Stones' $1M advance, eventually keeping 7 years worth of interest.

 

Easily, I would have thought.

And there’s also Touch Me, Hello I Love You and all those others.

But, hold on: although RK is acknowledged as the writer of those songs, doesn’t the authorship credit the whole band?

 

I belive Slade went into tax exile for a period in the mid-seventies, under the pretext of ‘cracking America’ (which they neve managed).

Their popularity declined in Britain while they were (far, far) away.

 

He doesn't have share with the composer? I don't think that's accurate.

 

Does it gets lots of licensing (featured in adverts, etc) in America?

 

That's what I thought

Also, Morrison wrote the "death verse" ("funeral pyre")

 

Funny thing is his son hated Santa's Silly Sled.
PS- the movie score is quite good, from Badly Drawn Boy.

 

Satire and parody have protected status. Do you think all those witless morning shock jock songsters split royalties?

No, it was decided by the Supreme Court in Acuff-Rose Music v. 2 Live Crew that they did not owe royalties for their parody of the song Pretty Woman.

Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc.

I'd have to dig up the transcription of the argument before the court, but I seem to remember that one of the justices said that parody "even witless and stupid parody" deserved the highest level of protection.

 

I think he was possibly exaggerating: Slade were big in Europe, too, during that period.

Interesting story (apologies if I’ve told it before): I once worked with someone whose mother was Nod’s girlfriend during the late sixties. He asked her to marry him but she turned him down because she didn’t think he’d ever be able to make a living - all he ever wanted to do was play in a band and write songs and, while they were a couple, he was getting nowhere. She chucked him, and a few years later......

 

Pros and cons. According to wikipedia, Wizzard's I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday reached number 12 last year, something that couldn't happen before streaming. Add in the radio and TV revenues, a nice little earner for Roy Wood.

 

Strongly dislike that film and ESPECIALLY the bloody awful BDB score.

Toni Colette is good in it, though.

 

In recent years, Roy has complained about ‘declining ‘royalties. I wouldn’t mind having his ‘money troubles’, I must say....