According to today’s Huffington Post, “Some of the world’s largest recording companies are suing “The Ellen DeGeneres Show,” claiming producers violated their copyrights by playing more than 1,000 songs without permission.”

It’s just an allegation, and if Jon Gosselin has taught us anything, it’s not to… wait. He hasn’t taught us anything. But on behalf of people who make their living getting paid making music, Ellen, please tell us you’re paying for the music you’re playing on your wacky show.

If not, I can only hope that hell will look like you sitting trapped at a desk, listening to one horrifying singer after another, for all eternity. Oh wait, that’s going to be your life. Never mind. We’re even.

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Mike Errico official site: http://www.errico.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Mike-Errico/8888939428
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Somewhere between Apache helicopter simulators, music genomes and the infamous “vagina video” lies Jingle Punks, the innovative music licensing brainchild of co-founders Jared Gustadt and Daniel Demole.

By Mike Errico
July 16, 2009

What were you before you were Jingle Punks?

Jared Gustadt: I was playing in a scrappy power-pop band called Group Sounds. We were lucky to open for bands like the Kills, Hot Hot Heat and Jet, but we’d basically open for anyone, no matter how good a fit it was, and take our chances with bottles getting thrown at us. At the time, I was also editing at MTV, and realized that they were having a problem clearing real bands’ music, so I started upselling ours along with bands that we knew. After about six or seven years of doing that, I decided I was going to stop focusing on the editing and the playing. Then I met Dan…

Daniel Demole: I came from more of a technical side. I used to do video game programming and large scale databases for the government. I also did weapons systems for the Apache helicopter simulators, which may be a little much for music licensing, but…[laughs] When I met Jared, he had an idea but not much more at that point, so we fleshed it out over a couple of weeks.

Jared: We went to a Black Keys show, and got really drunk that night and kept coming back to the Jingle Punks idea. Sometimes you get drunk at a bar and you’re like “LET’S START A BAND,” and then it’s not a great idea in the morning. But this stuck with us. And within three months we had the high-class problem of serving real clients without having a real business structure or funding.

Daniel: We had music, but had to figure out how to get it to our clients.

Which is where Jingle Punks’ “Jingle Player” software comes in.

Daniel: Yes. Pandora, which is basically a relational database, had already existed for a while. You can type in “Coldplay,” and you’ll get music similar to Coldplay. We studied that model, but we found that when you get to the executive level of some companies, these people don’t really have the music knowledge that most music supervisors have.

Jared: With the Jingle Player, you can still search by composer, but we’ve also provided cultural tags and moods, so you can search for something from, say, Juno, or you can type in “James Bond” or “Vegas.” Basically, we wanted to hit the smartest and the dumbest person on the totem pole.

What is the deal you give artists?

Daniel: I wanted the most iron-clad thing for our company, but the first thing Jared said was, “We have to be friendly to the artists because I was a musician and I realize how hard it was to get my music out there.” So what we have is something that’s one of the more friendly contracts. It’s basically a 50/50 split, where you’re updated on everything that’s happening with your music and you can pull your music out if you have to for whatever reason.

Jared: It’s a non-exclusive agreement that has a term that can be terminated as long as you’re in contact with us. I basically said to our lawyer, “What’s the best way to protect ourselves but at the same time not make it feel to the artist like we’re taking their music and saying, ‘See ya later.’” Because I hate that.

How many pitches are you working on in a typical day?

Jared: We’ll put together maybe five to six pitch bins per day, although the system is designed to have people go in and really search for themselves. We also have clients that either like some hand-holding or are just too busy. They know we can provide service for them.

What would you say are your big placement successes at the moment?

Jared: I’d say Real Housewives of Atlanta, ABC’s The Unusuals, and a huge part of MTV’s Engaged and Underage. Reality shows run the gamut of every style, so to me that was a big test for us.

How much original composition are you doing?

Jared: I’m not doing as much as I’d like to, but I do, occasionally. If something needs to be custom-made, our first thought is to send it off to one of the artists on our roster as a work for hire. Having more music to choose from helps to fill out the pitches.

Where are you in the evolutionary stage of the company?

Daniel: We started out in August of last year, and the software was pretty much done by around January. By then we were already servicing clients who didn’t really know the company was in its infancy. Now, we’re ready to go international. Our new Web site has launched, and we have invested in upgrading to cloud servers that are lightning fast.

In some circles, Jingle Punks is known as the company co-founded by “The Vagina Guy”…

Jared: Yes, I’d say it’s the best icebreaker in the business. Our band had just broken up, and at our last rehearsal we decided to make one last stupid video just to put our stamp on the music world once and for all. The video [for "Temporarily In Love"] is an all-encompassing statement of what that band was, which was not a lot of talent, but a lot of crazy ideas.

Jared: It is funny to walk into a meeting and get, “Hey, you’re the Vagina Guy!” I mean, if that’s what you want me to be, OK. I’m a father of two, also, and pretty decent musician…

And you’re sitting next to “The Apache Helicopter Guy.”

Daniel: That’s very much a metaphor of how we work… he’s talking about vaginas and I’m trying to keep us focused on the next target.

Jingle Punks official site: www.jinglepunks.com

[Full disclosure: After writing this, I added part of my own catalog to Jingle Punks.]

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Mike Errico official site: http://www.errico.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Mike-Errico/8888939428
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/Tallboy7Vids