Prince co-write on Stand Back?

[KarmaContestant]

https://soundcloud.com/#kwes-chenebe...e-red-corvette

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CCPLCnICzc

The instrumentals of Little Red Corvette and Stand Back, for comparison.

[Jondalar]

Originally Posted by KarmaContestant

Except he didn't write the music for Stand Back. The instrumentation of Stand Back and Red Corvette are totally different. The lyrics for one can be hummed over the other because one is based on the other, that doesn't mean they are the same instrumentals, and it certainly doesn't mean that Prince wrote the music for the song. Quite a stretch, there.

If Prince had wanted writing credit, he could have got it, as could any musician who contributes an original part. It's all in the contract and the details agreed upon between the two parties. I never said it makes you entitled to songwriting credit - I said that technically, that musician has written a part of the song and could press for songwriting credit.

Right. She wrote a counter song inside of his song. If she stole the song then it would sound like Little Red Corvette.

[sorcerer999]

There are some bands (U2 for example) that come together and create a song which all 4 band members share the credit.

Then there are some solo artists, like Stevie, who write a song on piano or guitar or whatever. They essentially write the lyrics and melody (the skeleton of the song, if you will) and later have other musicians flesh out drums, bass, synth, strings, etc. These musicians (bass, guitars, etc) essentially are only creating "counter melodies" and the drummer is only really creating the rhythm cycle that compliment the original song. They don't get songwriting credit because they didn't write the words or the melody, which is really the only thing BMI/ASCAP, etc cares about when submitting a song to be copy written.

If this were not the case, then there would be no such thing as a "recorded and released" song solely by Stevie. Each song would share co-writing credits with Lindsey, Waddy, Benmont, Roy, etc. But such is not the case.

Stevie has always been one to give credit where it is due. Roy Bittan wrote the bridge to "Think About It" and is credited. Sandy Stewart gets credited for writing the music to "Nightbird", "If Anyone Falls", etc.

I agree with KarmaContestant that the melody for "Stand Back" bears no resemblance to the melody for "Little Red Corvette". Sure you can sing the chorus of both songs over each other, but that's only because the notes fit the melody...and one can do that with ANY song if they think about it. Try singing the lyrics to MGMT's "Kids" over the music of Coldplay's "Life In Technicolor". It fits perfectly. Yet they are two different melodies.

Sorry to rant, but like Jondalar said, Stevie gave Prince the option of being CREDITED as a co-writer, since she was "inspired" by LRC , but he declined the CREDIT. Still pretty sure he's getting paid royalties for it though, because he played on it.

[BlueDenimLamp]

From the "Stand Back" wiki.Stand Back

Nicks has often told the story of how she wrote the song. She wrote it shortly after she was married to Kim Anderson. The newlyweds were driving up to San Ysidro Ranch in Santa Barbara when Prince's song "Little Red Corvette" came on the radio. Nicks started humming along to the melody, especially inspired by the lush synthesizers of the song, and "Stand Back" was born. They stopped and got a tape recorder and she recorded the demo in the honeymoon suite that night. Later, when Nicks went into the studio to record the song, she called Prince and told him the story of how she wrote the song to his melody. He came to the studio that night and played synthesizers on it, although his contribution is uncredited on the album. Then, she says, "he just got up and left as if the whole thing happened in a dream."[1] According to U.S. Copyright Office records, Prince is officially a co-writer of the song, even though he is only occasionally credited as such.[2]

[TheWILDheart]

Wasn't there something mentioned forever ago about her writing the lyrics to "When Doves Cry" as a thank you for "Stand Back" or am I totally dreaming?

[sorcerer999]

Originally Posted by TheWILDheart

Wasn't there something mentioned forever ago about her writing the lyrics to "When Doves Cry" as a thank you for "Stand Back" or am I totally dreaming?

No. He sent her the track for "Purple Rain" and wanted her to write the lyrics. She was too intimidated by the "epic-ness" of it all and sent it back to him, saying she couldn't do it.

[sorcerer999]

http://www.nme.com/news/stevie-nicks/59268

[bombaysaffires]

Originally Posted by sorcerer999

There are some bands (U2 for example) that come together and create a song which all 4 band members share the credit.

Then there are some solo artists, like Stevie, who write a song on piano or guitar or whatever. They essentially write the lyrics and melody (the skeleton of the song, if you will) and later have other musicians flesh out drums, bass, synth, strings, etc. These musicians (bass, guitars, etc) essentially are only creating "counter melodies" and the drummer is only really creating the rhythm cycle that compliment the original song. They don't get songwriting credit because they didn't write the words or the melody, which is really the only thing BMI/ASCAP, etc cares about when submitting a song to be copy written.

If this were not the case, then there would be no such thing as a "recorded and released" song solely by Stevie. Each song would share co-writing credits with Lindsey, Waddy, Benmont, Roy, etc. But such is not the case.

Stevie has always been one to give credit where it is due. Roy Bittan wrote the bridge to "Think About It" and is credited. Sandy Stewart gets credited for writing the music to "Nightbird", "If Anyone Falls", etc.

I agree with KarmaContestant that the melody for "Stand Back" bears no resemblance to the melody for "Little Red Corvette". Sure you can sing the chorus of both songs over each other, but that's only because the notes fit the melody...and one can do that with ANY song if they think about it. Try singing the lyrics to MGMT's "Kids" over the music of Coldplay's "Life In Technicolor". It fits perfectly. Yet they are two different melodies.

Sorry to rant, but like Jondalar said, Stevie gave Prince the option of being CREDITED as a co-writer, since she was "inspired" by LRC , but he declined the CREDIT. Still pretty sure he's getting paid royalties for it though, because he played on it.

I agree with most of your post, but if he's getting royalties it's because he's getting credit as a writer. as a musician you get paid for your services and that's it.

She wrote a NEW melody to HIS chord progression, that's why SHE would get half credit and he the other. On the version that is HIS music and HIS lyrics/melody, he gets full credit. No one is saying she didn't create a melody, but she built it off his music and chord progression, that is why he would have written half of it and why she could not list herself as sole writer (music and lyrics). for whatever reason he has said he doesn't want/need the public recognition on the label, but if he's getting royalties, he is indeed listed as cowriter on the legal paperwork.

Roy Bittan got credit because he rewrote a whole section of her song.
Sandy Stewart gets credit NOT for "performing" the music but because she WROTE the music. She wrote it, Stevie listened to the tracks and wrote a melody/lyrics on top of it. Same with Rick Nowels, Mike Campbell and others who have cowriter credit. Neale Heywood wrote the music to New Orleans. If Stevie writes the music and the lyrics/melody, and someone helps her refine it, then there can be a bit of a grey area about do you give them credit or not.. and it's a bit of a judgement call based on how different the song would be without that additional part. For example, Stevie claimed c0-writing credit on Seven Wonders, which was written music and lyrics/melody by Sandy Stewart. Stevie rewrote (actually mis-understood Sandy's lyrics) from "all the way down the line" to what we hear on the record "All the way down to emmeline" which frankly doesn't change the song at ALL, but she claimed co credit and got it because she's Stevie but Sandy was NOT pleased to give up half her royalties. (edited to say she may not have gotten half).

Also, Stevie heard a Tom Petty track (by accident, it was on a tape Mike Campbell gave her) and she wrote lyrics and melody to it and took it to Fleetwood Mac. Tom Petty heard, was furious, and in her words, called her screaming at her that she could NOT use that music-- she had not asked his permission, and it's his intellectual property. He told her she had to give it back. She tells the story of how she had to go back to FM and in her words "tell them I was a thief" (a little humor on her part) and that FM could not use the song because she did not write the music AND more importantly did not have Tom's permission to use his music (if he had said ok she could have used it, would have had to list him as cowriter and paid him half the royalties). Prince could have done the same thing, but he did not.

[Jondalar]

Originally Posted by KarmaContestant

Except he didn't write the music for Stand Back. The instrumentation of Stand Back and Red Corvette are totally different. The lyrics for one can be hummed over the other because one is based on the other, that doesn't mean they are the same instrumentals, and it certainly doesn't mean that Prince wrote the music for the song. Quite a stretch, there.

If Prince had wanted writing credit, he could have got it, as could any musician who contributes an original part. It's all in the contract and the details agreed upon between the two parties. I never said it makes you entitled to songwriting credit - I said that technically, that musician has written a part of the song and could press for songwriting credit.

Originally Posted by BlueDenimLamp

From the "Stand Back" wiki.Stand Back

Nicks has often told the story of how she wrote the song. She wrote it shortly after she was married to Kim Anderson. The newlyweds were driving up to San Ysidro Ranch in Santa Barbara when Prince's song "Little Red Corvette" came on the radio. Nicks started humming along to the melody, especially inspired by the lush synthesizers of the song, and "Stand Back" was born. They stopped and got a tape recorder and she recorded the demo in the honeymoon suite that night. Later, when Nicks went into the studio to record the song, she called Prince and told him the story of how she wrote the song to his melody. He came to the studio that night and played synthesizers on it, although his contribution is uncredited on the album. Then, she says, "he just got up and left as if the whole thing happened in a dream."[1] According to U.S. Copyright Office records, Prince is officially a co-writer of the song, even though he is only occasionally credited as such.[2]

So the record company just decided not to include as a cowriter. Wouldn't they make sure of that. Can I see that copyright, not wickepedi a?

[WildHearted]

Originally Posted by KarmaContestant

Except he didn't write the music for Stand Back. The instrumentation of Stand Back and Red Corvette are totally different. The lyrics for one can be hummed over the other because one is based on the other, that doesn't mean they are the same instrumentals, and it certainly doesn't mean that Prince wrote the music for the song. Quite a stretch, there.

If Prince had wanted writing credit, he could have got it, as could any musician who contributes an original part. It's all in the contract and the details agreed upon between the two parties. I never said it makes you entitled to songwriting credit - I said that technically, that musician has written a part of the song and could press for songwriting credit.

Not really. "Songwriting" from a copyright standpoint is the melody as it relates to the underlying chord progression. The arrangement is a separate entity altogether. If the person who wrote the chord progression/melody/lyrics wanted to voluntarily give a person who came up with an instrumental line or whatever a portion of the songwriting credit, they could, yes, that's true; Just like Stevie did for Lindsey's guitar solo in Frozen Love. Just Like Chris, Stevie, and Lindsey did for Mick and John in The Chain. You could also give Joe Blow that wasn't even there for the session a credit if everyone involved agreed to it. But on their own the session player (essentially what we're talking about here) wouldn't be able to claim a songwriting credit because their contribution is part of the arranging and not the songwriting process, if all they actually did was come up with an instrumental part (bass line, etc).

This is why Stevie gets sole credit for her songs on Rumours, Tusk, etc, even though she obviously wasn't coming up with the drum beat or the bass line or the piano parts or any of that.

However, Stand Back is a different case because beyond just playing on the track, Prince wrote the underlying chord progression from which Stevie's melody was derived. She initially wrote the song over his already recorded track. They ended up sounding totally different, but we wouldn't have had Stand Back if it weren't for Little Red Corvette, therefore it's not unreasonable for him to have been offered (or recieved) a co-write. The same way that Dave Stewart played random chords and Stevie made up melodies over them for her songs on In Your Dreams and Dave received a credit for having written the music. Stevie came up with the melodies, but we wouldn't have had those melodies without Dave's chords.

[HoursAndHours]

Originally Posted by Jondalar

So the record company just decided not to include as a cowriter. Wouldn't they make sure of that. Can I see that copyright, not wickepedi a?

You can see it on the Copyright Office's website. It's in with document number V2425P459-492, listed as Stevie Nicks and Prince. It wasn't filed until 1989, so I wonder if the version with him playing it is actually not the version used on the record.

[sorcerer999]

Originally Posted by bombaysaffires

Roy Bittan got credit because he rewrote a whole section of her song.
Sandy Steward gets credit NOT for "performing" the music but because she WROTE the music.

Agreed. Which is what I was said before. I never alluded to the fact that they're credited simply for "performing" on the song. Roy wrote a new bridge and Sandy wrote ALL the music, which is why they are both credited for being Co-Writers.

[Jondalar]

Originally Posted by HoursAndHours

You can see it on the Copyright Office's website. It's in with document number V2425P459-492, listed as Stevie Nicks and Prince. It wasn't filed until 1989, so I wonder if the version with him playing it is actually not the version used on the record.

I'm sure she would give him credit if he wanted credit. It's fishy he is never listed as cowriter

[bombaysaffires]

Originally Posted by sorcerer999

Agreed. Which is what I was said before. I never alluded to the fact that they're credited simply for "performing" on the song. Roy wrote a new bridge and Sandy wrote ALL the music, which is why they are both credited for being Co-Writers.

you're right, my bad. I read your post as saying Sandy played when you said Sandy wrote.

[HoursAndHours]

Originally Posted by Jondalar

I'm sure she would give him credit if he wanted credit. It's fishy he is never listed as cowriter

People go uncredited in liner notes all the time. His name is on the copyright, so he's almost assuredly getting paid.

As a long time Prince fan, this whole story suggests to me that Stevie is one of the women that Prince really respects on her own artistic terms - in that he never tried to produce her, or make her one of his "protogés."