Successful tour and rap theft
2004-12-15
So the world tour has almost come to an end, only one show left this weekend in Moscow - something we have looked forward to for quite some time. This has been the over all most successful Therion tour ever. So a big thank you to all our fans that showed up at the concerts and made our experience on stage something very special almost every night on the entire tour! We can't wait to go on tour again!
As no one can have missed there's this discussion on the forum regarding the theft of Draconian Trilogy - The Opening in a hip hop production. The theft is not only the composition, but also the audio recording it self, wich means this is a case not only for our music publisher Prophecies Publishing, but also to Nuclear Blast records. Legal action are being prepared by the two companies.
Thank you to you fans who discovered this and brought it to our attention.
However, I would like to state that by principle I don't have something against ANY sort of music being mixed.
Hip hop and rap music is really NOT my cup of tea and I find 95% of all rap I've heard as total crap and the remaining 5% as something I can respect, but don't like. However, I know that many people - also very good musicians - would say the same about metal music. So if some rap artist would be a huge Therion fan and wanted to incorporate some Therion stuff, I would actually give my permission for that (though, it is actually - legally speaking - the music publisher that have to authorize it), given the fact that it was clearly written on the CD that a Therion composition written by me was the fundament of the song.
One can not understand (or LIKE) all types of music on the planet, but I like to be open minded and if Therion could be transformed into hip hop by some rap artist and the rap fans would like it - why not? I don't need to like it and Therion fans don't need to like it either, but it's a shame to forbid artforms that we don't appreciete our self. It's like with the polarity in religion - if there's no good there can be no eveil. So if it wasn't for the fact that there's much crap music, the good music wouldn't stand out above it - it would simply just exist.
It's a similar principle of accepting different artforms when I did something new with Carl Orffs, "Carmina Burana" (though I re-recorded the orchestration of course - I would never sample audio from an existing recording like rap artists do - something that lower their status as artists considerably in my eyes), we did a version that was incorporating a totally different music style into the existing one. Some classical listeners may found that unacceptable and bad - still many young people into metal appreciated it.
So to sum it up. If this rap dude would have taken contact with our music publisher and said "Yo Man, me like Therion musica mucha mucho, amigos!", asked permission for using a lyric "sang" on top on the music and to be allowed to re-arrange the composition by adding on a drum machine, paid the publishing money for the music (the lyric part would have been his) and given me credit for the composition on the record (he could write "Arranged by" him self though), then I would have seen no problem with it. Not that we would be talking about much money for such a thing, it's a matter of principles. No idiot should steal both my composition AND my audio recording and then claim it to be his own and sell it on a record. That's first of all not serious or professional from an artistic point of view. Secondly, it is criminal behaviour, not in any way comparable to if someone download some mp3's or burn a CD from a friends original for personal use or using a prated software.
This rap theft is first of all making money on some one else's work, something that have costed us much money and efforts to create. Secondly it is taking credit on other peoples talent and creativity, by saying "I wrote this song" when all they did was some simple drum programming on top on selected parts of a Therion song musically speaking.
This theft we have here is like if you would take a computer program, change some of the graphics in it, re-name it and then sell it openly (not even as a pirate program) and claim that it was you who wrote the program. Or similar to what Ivo said in the News, if your would re-edit Lord of the Rings, cut in some of your own home made scenes and then try to market it as a new movie called "Ring Master" totally produced and directed by your self.
As no one can have missed there's this discussion on the forum regarding the theft of Draconian Trilogy - The Opening in a hip hop production. The theft is not only the composition, but also the audio recording it self, wich means this is a case not only for our music publisher Prophecies Publishing, but also to Nuclear Blast records. Legal action are being prepared by the two companies.
Thank you to you fans who discovered this and brought it to our attention.
However, I would like to state that by principle I don't have something against ANY sort of music being mixed.
Hip hop and rap music is really NOT my cup of tea and I find 95% of all rap I've heard as total crap and the remaining 5% as something I can respect, but don't like. However, I know that many people - also very good musicians - would say the same about metal music. So if some rap artist would be a huge Therion fan and wanted to incorporate some Therion stuff, I would actually give my permission for that (though, it is actually - legally speaking - the music publisher that have to authorize it), given the fact that it was clearly written on the CD that a Therion composition written by me was the fundament of the song.
One can not understand (or LIKE) all types of music on the planet, but I like to be open minded and if Therion could be transformed into hip hop by some rap artist and the rap fans would like it - why not? I don't need to like it and Therion fans don't need to like it either, but it's a shame to forbid artforms that we don't appreciete our self. It's like with the polarity in religion - if there's no good there can be no eveil. So if it wasn't for the fact that there's much crap music, the good music wouldn't stand out above it - it would simply just exist.
It's a similar principle of accepting different artforms when I did something new with Carl Orffs, "Carmina Burana" (though I re-recorded the orchestration of course - I would never sample audio from an existing recording like rap artists do - something that lower their status as artists considerably in my eyes), we did a version that was incorporating a totally different music style into the existing one. Some classical listeners may found that unacceptable and bad - still many young people into metal appreciated it.
So to sum it up. If this rap dude would have taken contact with our music publisher and said "Yo Man, me like Therion musica mucha mucho, amigos!", asked permission for using a lyric "sang" on top on the music and to be allowed to re-arrange the composition by adding on a drum machine, paid the publishing money for the music (the lyric part would have been his) and given me credit for the composition on the record (he could write "Arranged by" him self though), then I would have seen no problem with it. Not that we would be talking about much money for such a thing, it's a matter of principles. No idiot should steal both my composition AND my audio recording and then claim it to be his own and sell it on a record. That's first of all not serious or professional from an artistic point of view. Secondly, it is criminal behaviour, not in any way comparable to if someone download some mp3's or burn a CD from a friends original for personal use or using a prated software.
This rap theft is first of all making money on some one else's work, something that have costed us much money and efforts to create. Secondly it is taking credit on other peoples talent and creativity, by saying "I wrote this song" when all they did was some simple drum programming on top on selected parts of a Therion song musically speaking.
This theft we have here is like if you would take a computer program, change some of the graphics in it, re-name it and then sell it openly (not even as a pirate program) and claim that it was you who wrote the program. Or similar to what Ivo said in the News, if your would re-edit Lord of the Rings, cut in some of your own home made scenes and then try to market it as a new movie called "Ring Master" totally produced and directed by your self.
