At the Hillbilly Studio Records I respect the rights of an artist to their song, both of those that are recording originals as well as those that are recording another artist works. When you sign the Hillbilly Studio Records Recording Agreement when you come in to record, you will be asked if you are going to monetize the recording or not. If you are recording a song and are not going to bring any income from the release of the song, such as Apple Play, CD Baby or any other distribution of the song that will pay you for your song, no worries.
However, if you either are going to right away or maybe sometime down the road you do want to release the song you recorded at The Hillbilly Studio you MUST prove that you have the right to monetize the song. If it is an original, cool, it’s yours to do with what you want with it. I will check though PRO”s and other means to make sure it is original. Or you can provide the BMI or ASCAP number that song proving you have the rights to monetize the song. This is done with either your BMI or ASCAP registration number for the song or the license agreement from BMI or ASCAP that you have the license to record the song for monetary purposes. I do this to protect artists from stealing songs from someone else as well as protecting Hillbilly Studio Records for any liability that may come from releasing a song that I don’t have the rights to release.
Now for the publishing side of it. There are 2 ways to publish a song for monetary gain. One is to self-publish. You record a song and distribute it yourself, with no agreement with Hillbilly Studio Records or any other publisher to get a portion of the royalties from that song. If you have no agreement with a publisher, then all the royalties go directly to you. If you have an agreement with a publisher to get a portion of the royalties from the song, and you are self-publishing, then you must add the publisher to the ASCAP or BMI registration so that they can pay the publisher their portion of the royalties.
The second way is to use a publisher, like Hillbilly Studio Records, to distribute your song(s). When you choose this method, the publisher can register your song(s) with ASCAP or BMI. It will be assigned a registration number just as if you self-published, however you don’t have to do anything regarding the registration, the publisher takes care of all of those details. Also, the publisher list you as the writer of the song and designates what portion of the royalties will be sent directly to you. Taking out the worries that the publisher will rip you off.
It is up to you as to which method you use. If you choose to use The Hillbilly Studio as your publisher, great, as the studio has options for distribution and getting your song heard that you probably don’t have, such as Radio play and distribution to 150+ platforms across the world. As well as manage any licensing agreements that could arise. We do all the work, not you.
Finally, a few very important things to know. Hillbilly Studio Records WILL NOT publish AI generated works for monetary compensations, aka, royalties! AI is a tool to get demo’s made if you don’t have access to a studio to record live or can’t sing or play an instrument but you write awesome songs. There are options that Hillbilly Studio Records has to get your songs ready for publishing.
Next is that Hillbilly Studio Records reserves the right not to agree to publish a song and that could be for different reasons. First and foremost is that the studio only works with the genres of Country and Christian Music. It doesn’t mean we don’t like other genres, it’s just that our focus is on those two at this time. It could be as a publisher we feel that your songs don’t alien with my mission and values of the studio. What you do on your time is your business but when you are in my studio music that degrades people, our country or GOD will not be performed in my studio. Everyone has the right to freedom of speech, I myself will stand up for everyone’s right to express that right but in my studio with my Christian values I will not feel comfortable having that type of music in studio.
Your song may not be ready yet to be published. It may need some work and changes to have it a song that everyone will be proud to have their name attached too. I will work with you to get it ready to be published and discuss with you how to get it ready to be published.
Lastly, if you do decide to use Hillbilly Studio Records as your publisher, which I hope you do, you will be required to sign a non-elusive agreement with us. Which means that the studio has the rights to act as your publisher but you can give the rights to others to be your publisher as well.