By Mia Hudson, Life is Wisdom | In the dazzling, often dramatic world of music, we tend to think the singer is the only one who brought a hit song to life. But beneath the surface of iconic tracks lie forgotten creators and missed royalties, making for some truly heartbreaking stories.
Recently, The Pact, a new advocacy group, penned an open letter. They called out “a growing number of artists” demanding publishing royalties without contributing to a song. While performers earn from touring and merchandise, songwriters rely solely on publishing income. “Right now, hit songwriters are driving Ubers,” one lamented.
These tales highlight the perilous and sometimes unjust path from a simple idea to a chart-topping success, revealing how performers sometimes take undeserved credit or bands lose out entirely. Let’s pull back the curtain on these glamorous yet infuriating situations where the real creative minds behind the biggest hits didn’t receive the recognition or financial rewards they deserved.
- “Bitter Sweet Symphony” by The Verve: Few songs capture the melancholic grandeur of the late 90s like The Verve’s “Bitter Sweet Symphony.” Its sweeping orchestral motif and Richard Ashcroft’s vocals became an anthem, propelling the British band to global superstardom, a triumph of artistic vision that unfortunately led to complicated royalty disputes.
However, this sweet symphony turned incredibly bitter for The Verve. The iconic violin sample originated from an orchestral rendition of The Rolling Stones’ “The Last Time.” Though The Verve initially secured permission, a formidable challenge arose from Allen Klein, the Stones’ notoriously litigious former manager.
Klein asserted the band used “too much” of the sample. A devastating lawsuit followed. The court ruled The Verve would not receive a single penny in royalties for their biggest hit. Every cent flowed directly into Klein’s coffers, leaving the band empty-handed.
The injustice continued when the song was nominated for a Grammy, and Richard Ashcroft reportedly felt “burned-out” from the situation. It stands as a stark, cautionary tale: a masterpiece tragically unrewarded due to complex legal and financial entanglements.
- “Beat It” (Guitar Solo) by Eddie Van Halen: Michael Jackson’s “Beat It” is a pop-rock masterpiece, fusing the King of Pop’s rhythm with a raw, blistering guitar solo. That iconic moment wasn’t planned; it was the spontaneous genius of Eddie Van Halen, conjured in a mere 20 minutes.
The story behind this unlikely collaboration is intriguing. Quincy Jones, Jackson’s producer, reached out to Van Halen. He hesitated but, with bandmates away, figured, “who’s gonna know if I play on this black kid’s record?” He stepped in, not just to play, but to creatively rearrange parts, transforming the track.
Astonishingly, Van Halen did this favor completely unpaid. His only “compensation” was a casual “Here, you can it” and a six-pack promised by Jones – a promise never fulfilled. The insult compounded as he “never got credit for it on the album cover: there’s just a very big question mark behind the word guitar.”
This isn’t just generosity; it’s how monumental creative contributions to global hits can go unrecognized. Van Halen’s solo is a cornerstone of “Beat It,” yet he received no official credit and not a single penny for his genius.
- “All Shook Up” (Original writer: Otis Blackwell): “All Shook Up” evokes Elvis Presley’s iconic voice, capturing the dizzying sensation of falling in love. It hit No. 1 for eight weeks, an enduring Elvis anthem. However, the true authorship lies with the immensely talented, yet overlooked, songwriter Otis Blackwell.
The song’s creation narrative is murky, a testament to the era’s convoluted practices. Conflicting stories credit a Pepsi bottle, Elvis’s dream, or actor David Hess. Hess, however, states Blackwell wrote it, and “Presley took a writing credit in order to get him to record it.”
This highlights the core issue for songwriters. Elvis’s label, Hill and Range Publishing, notoriously “demanded that if he recorded a song, he would also get writing credit on it.” This meant Blackwell, the creative genius, had to cede a portion of his publishing royalties.
It’s a classic example of “artists taking publishing” for “nothing.” Blackwell created the song, yet had to share financial rewards, losing income to the star whose fame he helped build.
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Most of these are Elvis songs but there are some newer ones like “Red, Red Wine”:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/entertainment/news/hidden-hitmakers-16-songs-where-the-original-writers-were-robbed-of-royalties/ss-AA1RztJR?ocid=hpmsn&cvid=693b9cc5f5e34486a4292494e4062b1b&ei=92#image=17