Who You With?

Never thought publishing and performer rights organizations would be looked at as a gang. Well not really but you get what I'm saying. The primary organizations are the infamous BMI and ASCAP. There's really no difference between the two, however, ASCAP does cater more to the Hip Hop genre while BMI does the same for Pop and Rock. ASCAP has a Song-Writers Conference in Atlanta which features Lloyd, Jermaine Dupri, Kerri Hilson, Bow Wow, and many more. That's usually where all my hip hop heads need to go. BMI would have a conference in New York featuring Willie Nelson, John Mayer, Brittany Spears, Jimmy Buffett and many more. The purpose of these conferences is for networking and learning. Now what these organizations do is record every time your record is played on the radio or on television. They track it and you get something in the mail called a Royalty Check once every quarter, or 3 months. (how much depends on how many times it gets played or performed at clubs or events) Now this is the FIRST thing you want to do when you are taking music more seriously and want to step into the league of professional musicians. Why? Well what if that track you have sitting on Garageband is the next Thriller? Yeah, its real simple. It usually only cost $35 to sign up, so it shouldn't take you long to sign up for it. Now which one to sign up for is totally up to you, you don't have to sign up for ASCAP if you rap. Just do your research and choose the one that you're most comfortable with. But save those quarters, do your research, and go do this first.