Follow Version, karaoke, tributes, parody, orgel and covers

1. Versions. To indicate that a Version Track is different from the original, please use the corresponding field for this purpose. Version information will not be accepted as part of an album title. You should also use standard spelling, without abbreviations, and make a proper use of capitalization.

2. Name of the original artist on parody, version, karaoke, tribute and cover tracks or albums. For Parody, Karaoke, Tribute and Cover albums, the name of the original artist should not be displayed in any artist field on track level, nor at the album’s level. You must use clarifying language to ensure that consumers will not think those original artists are performing on your album or track.

• Karaoke exceptions: The karaoke track titles can refer to the original artist. Please, use sentences to clarify that these artist aren’t the performers. Use sentences as “Originally Performed by… (original artist name)”.

3. Name of the original artist in the track or album’s titles. The title of a track, as the title of a cover of tribute album, must not make any reference to the original artist. Do not use phrases such as: “Original Performed by”, “In the Style of”, “Tribute to”, “Cover of” or similar.

4. Information of karaoke version. The karaoke albums or tracks must be indicated on the corresponding field as “Instrumental” of “Karaoke” versions. The primary genre of this king of album or tracks must also be set as “Karaoke”.

5. Deceptive or misleading information. Tribute or cover albums must not be deceptive or misleading.
Do not use genres, popular song lyrics, or the original artist names as the album title, track title, or artist for karaoke. Content that is considered deceptive or misleading will not be accepted and distributed.

6. Sound-a-likes. Sound-a-likes (cover songs that sound like copies of the original) or unauthorized remixes with deceptive or misleading audio, will not be distributed.

7. Cover licenses. For a cover you will need to present an authorization signed by the original rights owner – who will allow you to use the work for commercial purposes.

• You can obtain a license through different online services, as for example www.easysonglicensing.com. You need the license only in case that the adapted songs belong to an Anglo-Saxon area. If the songs are from a latin area, South America and Occidental Europe – excluding Aglo-Saxon countries –  it is enough to mention at the track level the original composer and the publishing house (label and/or producer rights owner) assigning their correspondent roles. For versions from territories that we don’t comment here, please, contact our Support team.

• If the version modifies substantially the work, as a radical variation of the lyrics/musical content, you must present a more specific rights owner permission to distribute the content. The documentation reported has to be contrastable and true.

• Attention: Do not confuse the term “version” or “cover” with a “remix”. If you did a remix or if you are using any recording sample that belongs to another person, you will have to request the authorization from the original master owner.

8. Continuous mixes and DJ sets. Dj sets (with own or other’s artists tracks) and continuous mixes (that is, putting all the tracks of an album together in a single track creating a continuous mix) are not allowed by the channels.