This is a question that I've tried to ask before, but I got no replies,  :\'( I hope to get some now. Here goes, if I wanted to record and/or perform one of my parodies, and put it on YouTube like a lot of you have done, what are some steps
as to go about doing it, without risking getting my butt sued and torn off at the same time?  :o ???

I felt real uneasy about the sue issue stuff too before Below Average Dave encouraged me.  What I've recorded in the past isn't anything that would make anyone mad.

This is a question that I've tried to ask before, but I got no replies,  :\'( I hope to get some now. Here goes, if I wanted to record and/or perform one of my parodies, and put it on YouTube like a lot of you have done, what are some steps
as to go about doing it, without risking getting my butt sued and torn off at the same time?  :o ???


As of I always stated, parodies are generally protected by the law.  Lawsuits over non-commercial parodies are, well, very very rare because 1) It costs a lot to go after someone over something that may very well get thrown out of court, 2) Negative Publicity to the people behind the suit, 3) Little or no commercial gain means they can't make much off it if they do sue and win, 4) Many main stream artists openly support parodies (Heck Lady Gaga has been known to post parodies of her work from YouTube to her own Twitter, Facebook and MySpace accounts and many other major artists (Green Day, Katy Perry, Madonna, et al) have also stated publicly that they support parody).  

The truth is, parody is a tricky thing to define in the eyes of the law, they look at four things.

1. Character of Use
The most important factors here are A) Does the parody alter the purpose of TOS, B) Does the song comment or criticize TOS, C) Is it commercial or non-commercial

Let me elaborate especially on C, Commercial parody does NOT automatically violate Fair Use laws, in fact, many commercial parodies are sold regularly just as non-commercial parodies are available freely.  However, non-commercial parodies make an even stronger case off the get-go, the other two factors play a bigger role.  Most parodies do alter the purpose of TOS, they don't reuse the majority of TOS for their purpose lyrically-if they do you'll fail that test, but generally that's not the case.  Songs that criticize TOS have the strongest stance, especially in commercial cases, as they are heavily protected by the first amendment.  Most of my parodies do not directly target TOS in the lyrics, but the recording clearly exaggerate the silly backing vocals etc.  

2. Nature of the Copyrighted Work
This means the original purpose, a how to book for national security or media strictly for education has a higher standing than say Katy Perry or Adam Lambert, who are both strictly entertainment

3. Amount of Copyrighted Work Used
There's no set amount, but generally the less the better.  Obviously in music parody, you are going to use a similar sounding backing track, obviously taking the master track's backing track and recording over it is a no no (this is why you should never download free backing tracks through peer sharing file networks for this purpose, you'll often find that they are the REAL master tracks that the artists themselves created) but the lyrics themselves are going to be so significantly changed that its hard to imagine a good parody being too similar to The Original Song

4. Value of Copyrighted Material
Bluntly, is this going to hurt the original's sales.  The best way to think of this is, can it serve as a substitute to where someone will say, hmmm. . .you know Wild Child JIN's "S&M" is almost just as good as Rihanna's "S&M", but his is 50 cents cheaper, I think I'll buy WCJ instead of Rihanna's. . .this obviously is not the case with parody.  If yours is substantially different it can't serve as a substitute.  For example: No one is going to buy my current single "Young & Old" in place of the original by Katy Perry, "Hot N Cold" because they are unmistakeably different.  You can substitute Tide for Cheer, but you can't substitute it for Bounce Fabric Softener--they are totally different things and buying one will not affect your decision to buy the other.

I hope this helps, really all that thought is my 'in case I run into this' problem, but most artists understand parody more than the public gives them credit for, and even some big labels have come around a bit.  Heck, the literal version of Total Eclipse of the Heart was taken down back 6 months ago, but Warner Brothers release their copyright claim when they realized how popular the parody had become and that it was a parody that used only the video, and they had a legitimate claim on the video if they wanted to pursue it (Dascott Jr is the creator of the song I speak of now). . .so parody may occasionally walk a line, but the best advice, don't let that stop you from enjoying your music.  Worst case scenario is generally those who have a bug up their butt, and some do who shall remain nameless here, will have your song removed.

Blaydeman recently went through this dilemma, while his first song was removed (Sweater U Like) because of a situation I described above (not sure where he got it-but somehow he ended up with the actual Whatever U Like Master Track) but when he went and got permission to use a non-master track, the song was allowed and he has since posted two others.

I actually have yet to have a song removed, I won't be devastated if it ever happens, I mean some artists are against criticism, luckily my favorite artists are not--and I've received contacts from at least two of them on different recordings in support of my work (Just shout outs saying awesome job on ____ song--for their privacy I tend not to reveal names of personal contacts unless they wish to make their appreciation public themselves).  

There are many artists out producing their own parodies now, for simplicity I'll keep it to this site, but of course myself, Below Average Dave, Blaydeman, Matthias, Rick Cormier, Spaff.com, Peter Andersson, Red Ant, Ann Hammond, Ethan Mawyer, Jeff Reuben, Emi Loca, Nuclear Bubble Wrap, Silly "Nelson" Duncan, and many others have been known to record their own personal stuff.  Some amateurs, such as Peter Coffin, Insane Ian, The Great Luke Ski, Devo Spice, Venetian Princess, and Greg Scarnici, have made some profit off their work--I don't include myself on that list because comparatively speaking I'm a newbie on the profit realm--I only recently got the confidence to start that--its gone well thus far. . .

Good luck, please make sure you post a link to them on the AmIRight main page when you do them so that all of your friends and fans on AmIRight can hear them, also they will likely end up on The Mad Music Archive, as nearly everyone I just named has, which is a huge podcast show site that has a weekly top 20, if not tell me and I can add them or ask DJ Particle to do so, as she is a huge supporter of indie parody music, which opens it to voting.

AmIRight's showing on the weekly chart is sometimes quite strong when we all vote, lately our force has been a bit weak, but this week my own Young & Old was on the chart, Jeff Reuben's Fondled by the TSA is on it, and the collaboration between myself and Conqueror of Parodies made the chart.  This same chart is topped by Weird Al's latest "Perform This Way" from his upcoming album.  I always encourage joining it and voting for your fellow AmIRighters to make a strong showing, I weekly vote for all the best parodies from AmIRight that are in the running and some non-AmIRight that I just really get a liking to, in order to support us AIR members. . .we are a large community, but hardly heard of in the recording world, I've been slowly changing that with Jeff Reuben's help by proliferating the AmIRight community in the recording realm. . .

Hope all this helps, as for backing tracks the best thing to do is to get permission from the creators, its easiest to do with non-commercial use, and not all backing track places are okay with it. . .plus it can cost quite a bit to build up a backing track collection--you can also make your own or use midis--though if you do the latter-get the free download Anvil so that you can edit out the ridiculous sounds all Midis unavoidably contain

Wow! thanks for the info, I have read over it and over it, to make sure I understand it, but I have one more question, it won't be as complex however, I purchase and sometimes download MIDI files and use a program which digitalizes the music to make it sound better.  The MIDI files have backing tracks as well as melody tracks, could I save these as sound files and use them?

Wow! thanks for the info, I have read over it and over it, to make sure I understand it, but I have one more question, it won't be as complex however, I purchase and sometimes download MIDI files and use a program which digitalizes the music to make it sound better.  The MIDI files have backing tracks as well as melody tracks, could I save these as sound files and use them?


The vast majority of midi files are released freely, that's how I started out.  I always removed the melody tracks myself, but then you really have to know the song

Thanks for taking the time to write and post this, Dave.  I learned a bit from it too.


As of I always stated, parodies are generally protected by the law.  Lawsuits over non-commercial parodies are, well, very very rare because 1) It costs a lot to go after someone over something that may very well get thrown out of court, 2) Negative Publicity to the people behind the suit, 3) Little or no commercial gain means they can't make much off it if they do sue and win, 4) Many main stream artists openly support parodies (Heck Lady Gaga has been known to post parodies of her work from YouTube to her own Twitter, Facebook and MySpace accounts and many other major artists (Green Day, Katy Perry, Madonna, et al) have also stated publicly that they support parody).  

The truth is, parody is a tricky thing to define in the eyes of the law, they look at four things.

1. Character of Use
The most important factors here are A) Does the parody alter the purpose of TOS, B) Does the song comment or criticize TOS, C) Is it commercial or non-commercial

Let me elaborate especially on C, Commercial parody does NOT automatically violate Fair Use laws, in fact, many commercial parodies are sold regularly just as non-commercial parodies are available freely.  However, non-commercial parodies make an even stronger case off the get-go, the other two factors play a bigger role.  Most parodies do alter the purpose of TOS, they don't reuse the majority of TOS for their purpose lyrically-if they do you'll fail that test, but generally that's not the case.  Songs that criticize TOS have the strongest stance, especially in commercial cases, as they are heavily protected by the first amendment.  Most of my parodies do not directly target TOS in the lyrics, but the recording clearly exaggerate the silly backing vocals etc.  

2. Nature of the Copyrighted Work
This means the original purpose, a how to book for national security or media strictly for education has a higher standing than say Katy Perry or Adam Lambert, who are both strictly entertainment

3. Amount of Copyrighted Work Used
There's no set amount, but generally the less the better.  Obviously in music parody, you are going to use a similar sounding backing track, obviously taking the master track's backing track and recording over it is a no no (this is why you should never download free backing tracks through peer sharing file networks for this purpose, you'll often find that they are the REAL master tracks that the artists themselves created) but the lyrics themselves are going to be so significantly changed that its hard to imagine a good parody being too similar to The Original Song

4. Value of Copyrighted Material
Bluntly, is this going to hurt the original's sales.  The best way to think of this is, can it serve as a substitute to where someone will say, hmmm. . .you know Wild Child JIN's "S&M" is almost just as good as Rihanna's "S&M", but his is 50 cents cheaper, I think I'll buy WCJ instead of Rihanna's. . .this obviously is not the case with parody.  If yours is substantially different it can't serve as a substitute.  For example: No one is going to buy my current single "Young & Old" in place of the original by Katy Perry, "Hot N Cold" because they are unmistakeably different.  You can substitute Tide for Cheer, but you can't substitute it for Bounce Fabric Softener--they are totally different things and buying one will not affect your decision to buy the other.

I hope this helps, really all that thought is my 'in case I run into this' problem, but most artists understand parody more than the public gives them credit for, and even some big labels have come around a bit.  Heck, the literal version of Total Eclipse of the Heart was taken down back 6 months ago, but Warner Brothers release their copyright claim when they realized how popular the parody had become and that it was a parody that used only the video, and they had a legitimate claim on the video if they wanted to pursue it (Dascott Jr is the creator of the song I speak of now). . .so parody may occasionally walk a line, but the best advice, don't let that stop you from enjoying your music.  Worst case scenario is generally those who have a bug up their butt, and some do who shall remain nameless here, will have your song removed.

Blaydeman recently went through this dilemma, while his first song was removed (Sweater U Like) because of a situation I described above (not sure where he got it-but somehow he ended up with the actual Whatever U Like Master Track) but when he went and got permission to use a non-master track, the song was allowed and he has since posted two others.

I actually have yet to have a song removed, I won't be devastated if it ever happens, I mean some artists are against criticism, luckily my favorite artists are not--and I've received contacts from at least two of them on different recordings in support of my work (Just shout outs saying awesome job on ____ song--for their privacy I tend not to reveal names of personal contacts unless they wish to make their appreciation public themselves).  

There are many artists out producing their own parodies now, for simplicity I'll keep it to this site, but of course myself, Below Average Dave, Blaydeman, Matthias, Rick Cormier, Spaff.com, Peter Andersson, Red Ant, Ann Hammond, Ethan Mawyer, Jeff Reuben, Emi Loca, Nuclear Bubble Wrap, Silly "Nelson" Duncan, and many others have been known to record their own personal stuff.  Some amateurs, such as Peter Coffin, Insane Ian, The Great Luke Ski, Devo Spice, Venetian Princess, and Greg Scarnici, have made some profit off their work--I don't include myself on that list because comparatively speaking I'm a newbie on the profit realm--I only recently got the confidence to start that--its gone well thus far. . .

Good luck, please make sure you post a link to them on the AmIRight main page when you do them so that all of your friends and fans on AmIRight can hear them, also they will likely end up on The Mad Music Archive, as nearly everyone I just named has, which is a huge podcast show site that has a weekly top 20, if not tell me and I can add them or ask DJ Particle to do so, as she is a huge supporter of indie parody music, which opens it to voting.

AmIRight's showing on the weekly chart is sometimes quite strong when we all vote, lately our force has been a bit weak, but this week my own Young & Old was on the chart, Jeff Reuben's Fondled by the TSA is on it, and the collaboration between myself and Conqueror of Parodies made the chart.  This same chart is topped by Weird Al's latest "Perform This Way" from his upcoming album.  I always encourage joining it and voting for your fellow AmIRighters to make a strong showing, I weekly vote for all the best parodies from AmIRight that are in the running and some non-AmIRight that I just really get a liking to, in order to support us AIR members. . .we are a large community, but hardly heard of in the recording world, I've been slowly changing that with Jeff Reuben's help by proliferating the AmIRight community in the recording realm. . .

Hope all this helps, as for backing tracks the best thing to do is to get permission from the creators, its easiest to do with non-commercial use, and not all backing track places are okay with it. . .plus it can cost quite a bit to build up a backing track collection--you can also make your own or use midis--though if you do the latter-get the free download Anvil so that you can edit out the ridiculous sounds all Midis unavoidably contain

Thanks for taking the time to write and post this, Dave.  I learned a bit from it too.



I'd also like to thank you too Dave, for posting all that valuable information, it will really help me, I saved it for later use. I hope that's O.K.  :)

Thanks for taking the time to write and post this, Dave.  I learned a bit from it too.


+1

...though it's significantly different to what things are like over here on this side of the pond.  Which is why my second CD will be original material rather than parody (currently 1/3 complete).

+1

...though it's significantly different to what things are like over here on this side of the pond.  Which is why my second CD will be original material rather than parody (currently 1/3 complete).


Which I think is totally insane by the way (not that you are doing originals; that's awesome, it means we can parody YOU, I only have three songs that can be truly parodied (though I suppose you can technically parody a recorded parody) --that to me is awesome in its own right)  I really wish the UK would have the free speech parody protection we generally have here (even if it is touch and go sometimes)