McLeod, K., & DiCola, P., with J. Toomey and K. Thomson (2011). Creative License: The Law and Culture of Digital Sampling. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Not read. The summary is drawn from Duke University Press’s description and Meghan Drury’s review (International Journal of Communication 5, 2011, pp. 1694–1696, CC BY-NC-ND). Page numbers below are the review’s citations of the book. A reading should check it first.
What the sources say it argues
- Method. The authors interviewed more than 100 musicians, managers, lawyers, industry people, journalists and scholars (Duke).
- History. Sampling is set in a history of sound collage, from Milhaud, Cage and Stockhausen and the 1956 novelty record “The Flying Saucer” (p. 38), and in the African diasporic tradition of hip-hop. The authors argue that sampling “reflects the ingenious innovations of musicians across geography and genres” (p. 73, as quoted by Drury).
- Law and licensing. After Grand Upright Music v. Warner Bros. Records (1991), sampling without clearance became a lawsuit risk. Composition and recording rights are held separately, finding the owners can take great time, and a licence costs from a few hundred to many thousands of dollars (Drury).
- The cost estimate. By estimating present-day licensing fees for the Beastie Boys’ Paul’s Boutique (1989) and Public Enemy’s Fear of a Black Planet (1990), the authors show that neither could be released commercially today (Duke).
- Cases. Alan Lomax holds a songwriting credit on Jay-Z’s “Takeover” through a chain of licensed samples (p. 96); Clyde Stubblefield, who played the “Funky Drummer” break, was never paid for its reuse. Drury notes the authors’ suggestion, not developed, that the system’s preference for melody over rhythm has a racial dimension.
- Reform. The authors doubt reform is likely and survey options, the most radical a reverse liability rule under which owners pay to block a sampling release rather than samplers paying to clear (Drury).
Why this is here
Filed at the owner’s request on 2026-10-20 as contemporary work in conversation with Lessig’s Remix (LIT-1298) at the intersection of property and expression. Lessig asserts, without data, that remix does not compete with what it remixes and that clearance burdens remix (C3 in NOTE-1023, rated weak; its Limitations say the economic core is not shown, and the reforms give no rates). This book is the nearest thing in reach to the missing data: interview evidence and fee estimates for what clearance costs in one practice. It concerns professional sampling, not Lessig’s amateur remix, so a reading would have to say how far the numbers carry.
It would also be read for CASE-100 and CLAIM-332: sampled breaks such as “Funky Drummer” are a case of cultural material taken up and passed on by many hands, with credit and payment tracking the legal owner rather than the maker. It does not bear on what survives a rendering (QUESTION-002) except through its history of collage.