From discreet Sent Mon, Oct 13th 1997, 07:18
From discreet Sent Mon, Oct 13th 1997, 07:18
>> >>it's called Matt using sarcasm to prove a point. Coldcut have always >>stood by the fact that sampling shouldn't even be an issue if you are >>using your samples in an original way. There are loads of people that >>have sampled our Ninja records and we never went after them because we >> >i considered that it might be a joke and thought carefully before posting >the original message but i reread the article and it really doesn't come >across as sarcasm especially if you read the whole thing in context.but if >you know for a fact that it was sarcasm and your not just jumping to your >boss's defence regardless then i suppose we will have to put that down to >bad interview technique or sloppy journalism.i mean this is too important >to dismiss.for musicians that use sampling,it goes to the heart of what we >do. >ninja tune/coldcut can afford to buy their way out of trouble, others >aren't so fortunate. If you know Matt at all, some times it can be difficult to tell how serious he is being. This opens him up to loads of quotes being taken out of context. Look no further than his 'it's not that we're so brilliant, it's that everyone else is crap' comment. I havn't actually seen the interview in question, but I can totally see Matt saying those things to point out the stupidity that is copyright infringement cases. As for us being able to buy our way out of trouble...Yes we could afford a minor charge or whatever, however if we were to get sued over the new Coldcut record we would be quite fucked. We certinatly don't have enough money to pull 10's of thousands of copies off shelfs and destroy them, not to mention all the legal fees and potential charges. We have been threatened with lawsuits before and yes, we have been sued a few times. It sucks. It's such a shitty issue. Usually the only people that will sue you are the ones that already have loads of cash and can afford to go through with it. It can be worked out so much more easily. If someone threatens to sue you and you are indeed guilty it's usually quite easy to work it out in a reasonable manner by offering some points on the royalties or publishing (just go to the source and keep the lawyers out of it...U2/Island vs. Negativland anyone?). We have actually gone on to work with people who we originally met because they were looking into the fact that we sampled them. It's the reason Coldcut got to remix James Brown. >> Did you honestly think he was serious? > >i believe people in the business are capable of anything. This is true, however Ninja Tune didn't get this far by being assholes. If we were ever to do what Matt was implying it would be the end of the label. If people didn't kill us they would at least stop buying our records. We are music people first, business second. Even our lawyer is a hip-hop head. >>I ment to say we will NOT be turning in any of our friends for >>sampling. Mightly hypocritical if we did. > >so it's only your friends that are safe? anyone else better watch out? why >don't you invite matt black to post personally to the list to confirm that >he would not shop anyone for using uncleared samples. Anyone who makes interesting music is a friend of Ninjas Take Care Jeff