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Re: Songwriting Credits
There’s a reason it didn’t get released back in the day…meh.
Absolutely.
Funny how it was initially on the UYI tracklist sent out to media outlets in the weeks before UYI release.
I was bummed when it wasn't on there....but thankful years later when I heard it.
Re: Songwriting Credits
It’s a weaker Out TA Get Me or Back Off Bitch….to me at least.
It's worse.
Excluding My World....not even a real song...it might be the worst thing recorded during the UYI sessions.
I can see why they threw it away on a pinball machine. Hell.....that deserved a better song. That pinball machine was awesome. I loved playing it at the pool hall.
Re: Songwriting Credits
ASCAP controls 30% of Absurd, so that's Dizzy's share on the song, since he's the only one of the listed writers who is represented by ASCAP. So the remaining 70% will be divided between Axl, Slash and Duff.
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Maybe someone has done this before, but I searched all the GN'R catalogue (song by song and writer by writer) on ASCAP/BMI, GMR (Global Music Rights) and SESAC - since these organizations are PRO's (Performing Rights Organizations) and collect royalties on behalf of songwriters and their publishers, they list all the musicians who receive songwriting royalties for each song. The data there are the result of the way a band has decided to split the publishing rights/royalties between the members and may not be identical to to the writing credits in an album's liner notes - for example, a band member may not be credited as one of the writers of a particular song, but may be entitled to royalties for it.
Axl is on SESAC, Slash and Duff are on GMR, and the rest of the members (old and "nu"), as well as the outside writers (West Arkeen, Del James, etc.) are on ASCAP or BMI. ASCAP, BMI and GMR report the percentage they control over other PRO's; for example, on a song listed as co-written by Axl, Slash, Izzy, Duff and Steven, ASCAP reports the percentage it controls, which corresponds to the combined shares of Izzy and Steven, and the same goes for GMR in regards to Slash and Duff's combined shares. SESAC doesn't provide this information, which would be Axl's share - however, in most cases it can be calculated based on the information from the other PRO's.
Appetite For Destruction and GN'R Lies
In the albums' liner notes all original songs are credited collectively to "Guns N' Roses" and, wherever the case, to additional songwriters (West Arkeen on It's So Easy, Chris Weber on Anything Goes, Reckless Life and Move To The City).
The information on ASCAP and GMR confirms what we know from other sources about how the publishing was split between the members: Axl 25%, Slash, Izzy and Duff 20% each, and Steven 15%.
More specifically:
1) For all original songs with no outside writers: ASCAP (Izzy, Steven) controls 35%; GMR (Slash, Duff) controls 40%; so the remaining 25% is Axl's share.
2) In the case songs with additional songwriters, as expected, the band members' shares are decreased:
- It's So Easy: ASCAP controls 54% (which includes Izzy's, Steven's and West Arkeen's shares); GMR controls 28% (Slash and Duff's combined share); so the remaining 18% is Axl's.
- Anything Goes, Reckless Life and Move To The City: ASCAP controls 41.5% (Izzy's, Steven's and Chris Weber's shares) and GMR controls 36% (Slash and Duff's shares). So the 22,5% that's left is, apparently, Axl's share.
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Use Your Illusion I and II
Unlike Appetite and Lies, the UYI liner notes list specific writers for each song (e.g. Axl and Izzy on You Could Be Mine, Slash and Axl on Locomotive, etc.).
However, that doesn't affect the way the publishing for each song is split: according to the PRO's, the four "main" members (Axl, Slash, Izzy and Duff) get a fixed percentage for each original song written entirely by the band. Only this time the way the shares were calculated was more complicated compared to the shares for AFD and Lies songs, so the percentages are not round figures (according to Slash's book, that happened because they had to calculate a small share for Matt - and I guess Dizzy, too - as well as because of the many outside writers like West Arkeen, Del James, etc.).
For example, although only Axl is credited for writing November Rain in the album liner notes, GMR (Slash and Duff) controls 47.68% and ASCAP (Izzy) 24.26% - and these shares apply for every original UYI song that doesn't have additional writers (the decimals in the ASCAP shares differ slightly from song to song - it may have to do with the publishers). The remaining percentages obviously include Axl's shares and, probably, Matt's and Dizzy's small shares (the data for Matt and Dizzy are not clear; ASCAP lists them as writers on some UYI songs and SESAC lists them on all songs). So, the fact that, for example, Slash is not credited in the liner notes as a co-writer on Estranged, doesn't affect his royalties.
The formula they seemingly used was: first they determined who wrote what (ie. the writers of each songs that we read in the liner notes) and the percentages of each one's contributions on each song (e.g. Don't Cry, 50% Axl and 50% Izzy); then they calculated all that together and determined each one's shares on the album as a whole (at least the songs that didn't have outside writers) so Izzy, for example, had a share around 24.5% on the album; and then they applied those percentages to each song.
More specifically:
1) Original songs with no outside writers: ASCAP (Izzy): 24,5%; GMR (Slash, Duff): 47,7%; so Axl's share is around 26-27% depending on Matt's and Dizzy's shares.
2) Songs co-written by outside writers:
- Right Next Door To Hell: GMR (Slash, Duff) 32.52%; ASCAP (Izzy) 16.18%. So the rest includes the shares of Axl, Timo Kaltio and probably Matt and Dizzy.
- Bad Obsession: GMR (Slash, Duff) 33.38%; ASCAP (Izzy, West Arkeen) 47.1%. So the rest includes the shares of Axl and probably Matt and Dizzy.
- Back Off Bitch: GMR (Slash, Duff) 38.84%; ASCAP (Izzy, Paul Tobias) no info.
- The Garden: GMR (Slash, Duff) 9.54%; ASCAP (Izzy, West Arkeen) 54.84%; BMI (Del James) no info. So the rest includes the shares of Axl, Del James and probably Matt and Dizzy.
- Don't Damn Me: GMR (Slash, Duff) 40.44%; ASCAP (Izzy, Dave Lank) 28.55%. So the rest includes the shares of Axl and probably Matt and Dizzy.
- Yesterdays: GMR (Slash, Duff) 15.72%; ASCAP (Izzy, West Arkeen, Billy McCloud) 68%; BMI (Del James) no info. So the rest includes the shares of Axl, Del James and probably Matt and Dizzy.
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Ain't Goin' Down (pinball machine)
GMR (Slash, Duff) 50%; ASCAP (Izzy) 25%; So the remaining 25% is Axl's.
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Shadow Of Your Love
ASCAP has no information on it. GMR and SESAC list Axl, Slash, Izzy, Duff, Steven and Paul Tobias as writers (without percentages).
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Appetite For Destruction 2018 reissue ("Locked and Loaded") - "new" songs
The Plague, New Work Tune and Ain't Goin' Down No More (instrumental) can be found only on ASCAP. All Axl, Slash, Izzy, Duff and Steven are listed as writers. ASCAP (Izzy, Steven) controls 37.48%, so their combined share is slightly higher than for Appetite/Lies songs.
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West Arkeen songs/"Hell House demos"
- Crash Diet: West Arkeen, Axl, Del James and Daniel Clarke are listed as writers. ASCAP (West Arkeen) controls 31%.
- Bring It Down Home: West Arkeen and Axl are listed as writers. ASCAP (West Arkeen) controls 50%, so the other 50% is Axl's.
- Too Much Too Soon: West Arkeen and Duff are listed as writers. ASCAP (West Arkeen) controls 90%, so the other 10% is Duff's.
- Sentimental Movie: West Arkeen, Duff and Del James are listed as writers. ASCAP (West Arkeen) controls 75%, so the other 25% is divided between Duff and Del James.
- There's no information at all about Just Another Sunday (most likely because it's not on the West Arkeen tape).
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Chinese Democracy + Oh My God
Like on UYI, the credits in the album's liner notes list specific writers for each song. But, in this case, the publishing is also split on each song separately. However, the album credits don't completely coincide with the names found in the repertories: in some cases, the latter list additional names (that is probably due to mistakes in the album's liner notes). Axl is on SESAC (doesn't give info on percentages). Dizzy, Robin Finck, Tommy Stinson, Paul Tobias and Pitman are on ASCAP. Buckethead, Brain and Josh Freese are on BMI. So the data provided by ASCAP and BMI about the percentages they control on each CD song may be actually informative, at least to an extent, about the actual contributions by each member.
Specifically (marked in red are the additional writers that are listed in the repertories but not in the album's liner notes):
- Oh My God: 50% Axl; 48% divided between Dizzy, Paul, Sean Riggs and Tommy; 2% Josh Freese.
- Chinese Democracy: 50% Axl; 27% divided between Josh Freese and Caram Costanzo; 21% divided between Dizzy, Paul, Robin and Tommy; 2% Eric Caudieux.
- Shackler's Revenge: 50% Axl; 45% divided between Buckethead, Brain, Pete Scaturro and Caram; 5% Robin.
- Better: 50% Axl; 50% Robin.
- Street Of Dreams: 63% Axl; 37% divided between Dizzy, Paul, Tommy and Robin.
- If The World: 55% Axl; 45% Pitman.
- There Was A Time: 50% Axl; 50% divided between Dizzy, Paul and Tommy.
- Catcher In The Rye: 67% Axl; 33% divided between Dizzy, Paul, Tommy and Robin.
- Scraped: 52% Axl; 48% Buckethead and Caram Costanzo.
- Riad N' The Bedouins: 50% Axl; 50% divided between Dizzy, Paul, Tommy and Robin.
- Sorry: 50% Axl; 50% divided between Buckethead, Brain and Scaturro.
- I.R.S.: 75% Axl; 25% divided between Dizzy and Paul.
- Madagascar: 50% Axl; 50% Pitman and MLK estate.
- This I Love: 100% Axl.
- Prostitute: 90% Axl; 10% divided between Paul and Robin.
So it seems that Axl reserved a fixed 50% for himself for lyrics, melodies and probably production. Then his percentage might increase depending on the part he had in writing the music. So, for example, it appears that Axl wrote most of the music on Prostitute (since he has 90%) and a big part of the music on I.R.S (since he has 75%).
Re: Songwriting Credits
Great job compiling all that.
Yeah years ago when we saw this stuff on there, UYI was all out of wack. If/when the box set happens, they should update the liner notes.
ASCAP controls 30% of Absurd, so that's Dizzy's share on the song, since he's the only one of the listed writers who is represented by ASCAP. So the remaining 70% will be divided between Axl, Slash and Duff.
Wow.
Chinese Democracy era songs are getting UYI era members writing credits.
It's funny how easy it was to retcon 20 years out of existence.
Re: Songwriting Credits
I know the Gn'R community loves drama but I don't think they cut Pitman out.
By the sounds of it, they had been cutting out his work on this song since Bumblefoot joined.
It wasn't going to be an electronic inspired song anymore, it was going to be funk and punk.
If Pitman did the bridge, it's his worst work by far and I can say that because I'm maybe 1 in 100 that has actually listened to his solo stuff, which is competent across the board.
Re: Songwriting Credits
Absurd is, in a way, a return to the band's old M.O., which is more convenient in the current situation The credit in the "liner notes" is collectively to "Guns N' Roses", like it was on Appetite and Lies. And as far as the publishing/royalties go, they're being split similarly to the Illusions: the "main" members and partners in the band (now Axl, Slash and Duff) get a cut regardless of who wrote what. It's not really that much different than Slash and Duff getting royalties for songs written by Hollywood Rose, or for Back Off Bitch and Shadow Of Your Love that were written by Axl and Paul Tobias in 1982, or for songs written by West Arkeen and Del James.
And then the other current members (practically just Dizzy) are getting a cut depending on if and what they have contributed in the songwriting.
What remains to be seen is whether Pitman's case is indicative of a pattern that will be followed with "nu" members (or at least some of them), or it just happened that whatever Pitman contributed to the song wasn't such that would require giving him credit and a royalty share.
