Publishing and songwriting credits

[William Bowe]

I just noticed that the back cover of 20/20 features publishing credits for each song, and on looking at others it appears that Beach Boys albums had not done so previously (although I only checked a few) but would do so thereafter. The publishing credits from 1969 to 1972 paint a confusing picture. On 20/20, the songs which credit Brian along with Mike or Carl are Irving Music, but Dennis's songs are Brother and Bruce's is Wilojarston. By Sunflower, Irving Music is in the past and everything is credited to Brother, except Tears in the Morning which, like The Nearest Faraway Place, is Wilojarston. However, it's a very different story on Surf's Up and Carl & The Passions - anything with Brian is Brother, but everything else is Wilojarston (except Ricky and Blondie who are Jungle Bunny, which is an interesting name). Everything on my copy of Holland is Carlin Music, which I guess is down to it being a British pressing.

Is there anyone out there who understands why there were separate Brother and Wilojarston publishing companies, or anything else about the publishing arrangements for that matter? I'm intrigued to note that Deirdre is Brother rather than Wilojarston presumably on account of Brian's co-credit, even though I think it's pretty well known the song is almost entirely Bruce's. Given the assignment of songwriting credits appeared to have important implications for publishing, and hence for royalties, could I surmise that they might not be 100% reliable in telling us who was actually involved in the writing of the song?

[STE]

I'm just gonna guess that Wilojarston stands for (Carl?) Wilson-Jardine-Johnston

[William Bowe]

I suggest they'd gone one better than that - the "lo" represents "Love". So clearly it's intended to be a composite of the full band's surnames, but for some reason there remained a concurrent entity called Brother Publishing.

[AndrewHickey]

I would guess -- and it is *only* a guess, I base this on *NO SUBSTANTIVE EVIDENCE WHATSOEVER* -- that it's an ASCAP/BMI thing.
For a long time, publishing companies were allowed to be associated with either ASCAP or BMI but not both, and so often in the US songs would be co-published by two theoretically different companies which were owned by the same people, and you'd get a credit like "Some Company (ASCAP)/Someother Company (BMI)".

So I suspect that Brother and Wilojarston were set up as the ASCAP and BMI (or vice versa) publishing entities.

[guitarfool2002]

Anyone can credit anyone else on these listings, if they choose, and if they are members of the organizations those "anyones" receive royalties. Most people do not, but there are the very famous cases where a credit was given and then listed as a gift (engineer Hank Cicalo with The Monkees' "No Time" who had nothing to do with writing the tune), or taken by force (any number of songs with names like Morris Levy getting a credit).

Or some bands have a setup where only one member receives credit for the entire song, when in reality, especially in groups, it is rarely a one-man show, yet look at credits for some of the bigger name rock bands of the past 10 years...sometimes it's just the lead singer getting credit, and in one very specific, successful band's case, this is pure nonsense since the guitarist(s) did most of the music.

I wouldn't take any credits listed for publishing or writing as definitive or even complete. They can help fill in some information or shed more light on the song's creation, but are in no way 100% accurate to what actually happened with the tune. It's all about what the person who files the papers decides to list.

(Personal note: I wish I had gotten credit for writing/playing a guitar part in a song that got used in a few movies and TV shows, but as I wasn't the "principal songwriter" and just a musician, yet one who wrote the part, I got zip.  )