Jeff Tweedy made this announcement:
The modern music industry is built almost entirely on Black art. The wealth that rightfully belonged to Black artists was stolen outright and to this day continues to grow outside their communities. No one artist could come close to paying the debt we owe to the Black originators of our modern music and their children and grandchildren. As an individual I have recognized the unfairness of the life I live in relation to the deprivation of people whose work mine is but a shadow of. I’ve tried to compensate for those inequities in both my public and private life. It hasn’t been enough.
I’ve often thought there should be an industry-wide plan to address this enormous injustice. Considering that our business prides itself on its progressive ideals and commitments to social justice, I’ve waited, thinking we would eventually put some type of sustained tithing in place — some initiative that would allow us all to redirect a portion of our revenue to the communities that have been deprived of it. I’ve resisted being the one to initiate such a plan for reasons I find unpersuasive now. I feel it’s important to pledge my personal commitment to paying this debt, and to publicly ask every one of my peers to work toward doing the same.
What I propose going forward is a program that allows songwriters and musicians to direct a percentage of their “writer’s share” revenue to organizations that assist and support Black communities. This could take the shape of a box to check on rights management contracts, putting it at the foundation of our business. Or it could take another shape entirely. I don’t possess the expertise to manifest this initiative, but I can begin to do my part by committing 5% of my writer revenue to organizations that are working toward racial justice, which include but are not limited to Movement for Black Lives and Black Women’s Blueprint.
To BMI, ASCAP, SESAC, and all other organizations that collect and disburse songwriter’s royalties, I ask you to please investigate a way to implement such a program. To industry leaders: please join me in forming a coalition. My small contribution alone is a sincere but insufficient gesture. Hundreds of us joining together could provide some tremendous relief. Thousands of us committing to a reparations initiative could change our business and the world we live in. Black Lives Matter. Thank you.
- Jeff Tweedy
Great idea!
What? Take part of royalties Dickey or Gregg's estate would have coming to them from May sales of ABB albums and sent part of it to Elmore James' estate or Willie McTell's?
What about the ABB putting Statesboro Blues, Done Somebody Wrong, Stormy Monday, Trouble No More etc etc on albums that have sold over a million copies? That was a lot of cash rolling into those black artists accounts. One Way Out is credited to Elmore James, Marshall Sehorn and Sonny Boy Wiiamson 2nd and Eat A Peach sold over 2 million copies and so did 1969-1979 A Decade of Hits. Song writing royalties have to be significant for the estates of these men. Now if some white recorded executive has it in his name as did happen with several because the artist needed an advance or a record deal, then yes the black artists is being screwed.. Steve Alaimo bought 500 dollars worth of Melissa when Gregg needed money and Gregg and Phil Walden tried to buy him out but he refused so Eat A Peach came out and he got a cut off Melissa on an album that went to number 4 and sold over 2 million copies. Gregg talks about all the money he lost to that creep because he refused even 10 000.00 on a 500.00 investment, shares the song writing credit with Gregg and didn't write one note or one word of the song. Gregg wrote it all!!
[Edited on 6/19/2020 by blackey]
What? Take part of royalties Dickey or Gregg's estate would have coming to them from May sales of ABB albums and sent part of it to Elmore James' estate or Willie McTell's?
He didn't say one word about taking anything from anybody. He said writers and musicians should have the option to direct money they make in the future to Black people. They can donate money but apparently can't directly donate proceeds in the way he's asking for. You could make an argument that there should be mandatory reparations and not donations, but Tweedy didn't ask for that, so why ignore the case he does make to argue against something he didn't say?
What about the ABB putting Statesboro Blues, Done Somebody Wrong, Stormy Monday, Trouble No More etc etc on albums that have sold over a million copies? That was a lot of cash rolling into those black artists accounts.
So it looks like you've confused songwriting credits with publishing rights. The Allmans were consistent about crediting the people who wrote their songs, which some of their peers did not always do. But then again it was also obviously the right thing to do legally and morally - so do they deserve that much credit for doing it? Are we going to praise people at church for NOT stealing off the collection plate just because they probably could have? That's setting the bar awfully low.
But the other issue here is publishing rights, which aren't necessarily owned by the person who wrote the song. Companies, producers and others cheated artists out of their rights all the time in those days. The Allman Brothers couldn't necessarily do anything about it and it isn't their fault, but it does mean that crediting the right person doesn't mean they generated any income for them. If only I could think of an Allman Brothers song where this exact thing happened...
One Way Out is credited to Elmore James, Marshall Sehorn and Sonny Boy Wiiamson 2nd and Eat A Peach sold over 2 million copies and so did 1969-1979 A Decade of Hits. Song writing royalties have to be significant for the estates of these men.
Like this one! Marshall Sehorn was not a Black artist, he was (from what I can see) a white record producer and later a music publisher. He did not write "One Way Out." It's much more likely he gave himself a songwriting credit to get a cut of the royalties, and thanks to the Allman Brothers, that probably paid off nicely for him since he didn't do any of the work of writing the song. All it cost the other two writers was 33% of the royalties they deserved. As you point out, this happened all the time. It's also true that the artists themselves stole from each other all the time. I don't know that Elmore James and Sonny Boy II both deserve credit for writing that song either.
Like you say, that happened all the time. It was mostly white people using contracts and laws to steal from Black people who didn't know the law and were in kind of a desperate position. That's part of what Tweedy is trying to address here. The other part of it is more of a moral question: if the Allman Brothers made $1 million off a song Muddy Waters wrote, and royalty deals and contracts say Muddy was only entitled to $10,000 - even if he gets every penny of that $10,000, is that really a fair way to divide that money?
Gregg talks about all the money he lost to that creep because he refused even 10 000.00 on a 500.00 investment, shares the song writing credit with Gregg and didn't write one note or one word of the song. Gregg wrote it all!!
At least Gregg made a choice to sell him the song! He didn't steal it from him. I'm not sure you can even say he took advantage since he didn't the song would ever be worth anything. Gregg made a deal that he came to dislike, but he still had half the publishing rights for Melissa and made plenty of money from that song and a lot of others besides. And at the time Gregg tried to but it back, half of that song might have been worth a lot more than $10,000.
