Legendary rock bassist and songwriter Bob Daisley – who made his name as member of Rainbow, Ozzy’s band, Uriah Heep, Gary Moore’s band, Black Sabbath, Yngwie Malmsteen’s band, and more – talked about all the disputes regarding songwriting credits on Ozzy’s first two solo records – 1980’s “Blizzard of Ozz” and 1981’s “Diary of a Madman.”
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Chatting with The Metal Voice, Bob started by explaining how songwriting and performing royalties work in general, saying:
“There’s a lot of different types of royalties. For instance, anybody can record, say, a Beatles song or something. You don’t get the writing royalties because McCartney and Lennon wrote that song, or George Harrison or whoever. But, you get the performance royalties because you played on it, it’s your version of that Beatles song. So if the record sells you get those [performing] record royalties, and the songwriting royalties go to the writers.
“Every time you buy a CD, or in those days a vinyl record, it was divided into different types of royalties out of that one sale. A percentage went to the writers, a percentage went to the performers, a percentage went on to the record company, like that.”