Tuesday, May 28, 2019

legal - Who should be contacted to request permission, for commercial songs (and cost ballpark)


While playing to Fifa, it occurred to me that there is probably a license that EA pay to musicians to play their songs in their game.


Does anyone know if there is a standard license for indie games, to be able to play commercial songs in the game? Either for the intro and for the game itself, like FIFA does.


I did a brief search and the suggestion is to contact the publisher of the specific group/singer; but 90% of the time they probably won't even read such email. Is this the only way?


Of course this won't apply for free music that is distributed to be freely used for any use; my question is specifically for commercial music from decently known artists.



Answer



Usually "decently known" musicians sell all their copyrights to the record label. So these are the people you need to contract when you want a license. Such record deals are usually exclusive, so the artist themselves could not sell you the rights even if they want to. Unless it's a lesser known artist, expect to pay a very large amount of cash for the rights to their music.



You should also definitely get a lawyer for the license negotiation to make sure you are buying exactly the rights you need.


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