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EMI Production Music offers amnesty on previously uncleared samples

By Chris Cooke | Published on Tuesday 1 September 2015

Good news for all you dodgy samplers out there, with your sneaky nicking of other people’s beats and chords, hoping no one will ever notice once it’s looped into the mix.

Sony/ATV’s production music business, EMI Production Music, is having a ‘sample amnesty’, which is novel. A plethora of artists have legitimately sampled recordings contained within the libraries of EMI Production Music, and its imprints like KPM, Music House, Ded Good and Selected Sound, but plenty more have used those samples on the sly.

Or so it’s thought. And now the Sony/ATV company wants to legitimise those uncleared samples, by offering a deal for future exploitation of sample-featuring tracks while promising to not go legal on past unofficial usage.

Says EMI Production Music Global Director Alex Black: “EMI Production Music has a treasure trove of original recordings spanning more than six decades. Our vision for this amnesty is to highlight the wealth of possibilities open to producers working with samples”.

He goes on: “We’re very excited about the new and exciting partnerships that will come from the amnesty. The chance to work with labels and artists who see the value in the library is a very thrilling prospect for us. We are also excited about the potential to bring recognition to our original composers by unearthing great tracks from the past that have sampled their music”.

Adds the Sony/ATV unit: “The amnesty will run for six months and any music properly licensed during this period will benefit from a licence for future use without any royalty back claim. However, samples which were already subject to clearance discussions and any unlicensed samples discovered by EMI itself will not be covered by the amnesty”.

So there you go. Anyone planning on sampling this article, please note we’re not offering any kind of amnesty and we’ll gladly see you in court.