Liszt...

"the coverplaying band is just like the pizza joint etc. that spring up around the GM plant etc."

No...not really...GM isn't going to the pizza place and saying "you're here because of us, so we want MONEY !"

The cover band is there JUST because of the songs...

I played in cover bands almost all my life..
If it was just about the songs ANYBODY could do it..
It was about wardrobe, attitude, practice, dedication, money invested in equipment, the willingness to travel, taking care of yourself, talking nice to the crowd...a million things BESIDES the songs.

Liszt...a race car driver can't compete unless he has tires on his car....In case you haven't noticed, the tire manufacturers
pay for his tires in exchange for him telling the world what tires he's using so other folks might be induced to buy the same tires.

I don't think my attitude is "cynical"

I think it's a logical look at how things are and should be !

You're promoting the inequities of the system as well...

You're saying "well...here's this little place nobody can check up on so we'll let them slide...but this band is doing real well playing covers in big joints where everybody can see them.So let's make part of the reward for all their hard work (and don't get me started about how much harder it is to cop licks from somebody else than make up your own stuff !)...let's reward them by making them pay every time they work !

No...man...Brians very wrong, and I think you are too.

But that's OK...being wrong is just being wrong...not evil....

I give Graham alot of credit......
He supports the system that I reject, and is man enough to say publicly that upon investigation he finds it is possibly not all it claims to be.

That's what a mensch does !

I see it as a two way street, Liszt.

Your contention is that without the songs the musican is nowhere.
I say that without the musicians, there ain't no songs !

So why should one pay the other ?

And, one more time...if the writer thinks he should be paid for the musicians use of the song..then tell me why the musician who performs the song shouldn't get a cut of the sales ?

If Joe Schmo and Mary Birdface hear me play a song they've never heard before, and want it at their DJ wedding (something that happens a bout a million times a day) and I tell them who it's by,,,,shouldn't I get a cut on the sale of the CD.
And if not....why not ?

If you're gonna say "cos' we can't keep track of that" then you are saying "let's place all this burden on the backs of those that have made themselves visible thru ther hard work !"

That's pathetic !
And unfair !

And I for one will have no part of it !
And I pity those that think that's an equitable situation.

Bob