[trexart]

I realize to get the most accurate answer I will need to go to a lawyer, but just interested in any knowledge people on here might have.

If I have the licensing rights to some old music club logos as given to me from the copyright holders, does that allow me to put a historically exact list of bands that played at that venue?

Here are 2 different cases:

1. Venue previously in the 1970s released a t-shirt with their logo and on the back a huge list of all the bands who had ever played there. With permission from the venue to reproduce it, would that be allowed, or would we now have to get permission from every single band listed on the shirt?

2. We have access to some advertisements of a venue's gig guide for a week. Reproduce the exact historical ad on the back of a t-shirt with the venue's logo on the front. For example it would say:
Wed: BAND
Thurs: BAND
Fri-Sat: BAND

I repeat, with the above, we would have full licensing rights to the clubs/venues and all bands or events listed would be historically accurate and no band logos would be used.

Thanks for your input,
Stephanie

 

[kimura-mma]

The venues and bands are separate properties. You would need permission to use the band names even though you are replicating old artwork. The venues probably had an agreement with the bands to use their names for t-shirts and ads back in the day. But those old agreements would not transfer to your new agreement with the venue.

 

[trexart]

Not sure if this is of use to anyone, but we visited a lawyer today, and maybe the laws are different here in Australia, but the above is not necessarily true. There is a bit of a gray area. Technically, if we have a flyer or ad that shows the line-up is a true representation of history, we do not need the permission of the bands. The gray area comes in where it is possible one or more of the bands could claim that the shirt is mainly selling because of their name, and not the club's name which would then be profiting off of the band's name.

Not a black and white answer, and not necessarily useful to anyone, but there you go.

Cheers,
Steph