Digital Dollars Due: SoundExchange

Over 8,000 artists are due money. Among them: Sal Mineo, Fela Kuti, Jim Carroll, Jules Shear, Afghan Whigs and Type O Negative (pictured above). Better step up or shut up (e.g., forfeit your royalties).

By Rev. Keith A. Gordon

Are you a bona fide recording artist, a musician with one or more albums to your name? Are you registered with Sound Exchange? If the answer to the first question is "yes," you'd better hope that your answer to the second question is also affirmative. Thousands of musicians are currently owed royalties by Sound Exchange, and if you don't claim the cash, it'll end up in somebody else's pockets.

Sound Exchange was formed by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), the music industry's lobbying arm, as a non-profit organization. Sound Exchange's primary reason for existing is to collect royalties for the digital transmission of sound recordings and then pay these monies back out to artists and record labels.

For example, Sound Exchange collects royalties from satellite radio stations like XM Radio and Sirius that play recorded music; from cable and satellite television (Muzak and MusicChoice channels); and from Internet radio stations like Pandora and LastFM. There's just one problem - Sound Exchange can't find many of the musicians that they owe royalties. Never mind that many are probably registered with organizations like BMI or ASCAP, or had label deals on which they are (presumably) paid royalties, Sound Exchange has been unable to send 'em a check.

On the organization's website they include a list of over 8,000 of these "lost artists," musicians and bands that are due money. Although Sound Exchange claims that they're currently paying royalties to some 31,000 artists, some critics claim that the number of "lost artists" might actually be as high as 40,000 musicians.

The list of thousands of those that are due unclaimed royalties from the digital broadcasting of their music includes both indie and major label artists, a long list of Hispanic musicians, and it cuts across the decades, from the 1960s through the current day. In some cases, exactly who is due the money is up for grabs, as the rights to many psychedelic-era bands like Moby Grape, Strawberry Alarm Clock, and the Electric Prunes (all on the list) have been swapped and sold like a shoebox of baseball cards.

In other cases, the artists have tragically passed away, especially in the case of early blues artists, as the estates of Son House, Blind Willie Johnson, Jessie Mae Hemphill, and Brownie McGhee, among others, are due royalties. But the more recently-departed are also owed royalties, the list also including artists like Kirsty MacColl, Fela Kuti, and Jim Carroll.

Most of the list of "lost" artists, though, seems to consist of rock and heavy metal bands and artists. There is quite a lot of talent represented here, from songwriter Jules Shear and jazz guitarist Ralph Towner to blue-collar rocker Joe Grushecky and soul giant Eddie Floyd. There are a heck of a lot of bands from the '80s and '90s, including the likes of the Afghan Whigs, Guadalcanal Diary, Lords of the New Church, Cravin' Melon, and Bare, Jr.  

Headbangers are represented by a wide spectrum of metal bands, including doomsters Saint Vitus, Malevolent Creation, Warlock, and Type O Negative. There are also the uncategorized oddballs and fringe rockers, from Slaves On Dope and Skinyard to rapper Tech 9ne and instrumentalists Man or Astro-Man? Even the estate of 1950s-era actor Sal Mineo is owed royalties for the single album that he released in 1957.

If these royalties aren't claimed by the artists within a certain period of time, they'll be forfeited to the organization. All recording artists are strongly urged to get in touch with Sound Exchange and see if you're owed any money; and if you haven't registered with the organization, you should do so as soon as possible so that you, too, don't end up "lost" and losing money in the future.