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A related story I found interesting at the time about Weird Al vs Lady Gaga: http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110421/10431413988/weird-al-denied-permission-to

• Keyframe 13y ago
  That story also shows what you can and cannot do without copyright holder's permission. If you don't have a permission, you cannot profit from your cover. If you have a permission, you have to pay royalties for your cover to the original author if you're exploiting your cover commercially.
  • gabemart 13y ago
    > That story also shows what you can and cannot do without copyright holder's permission. If you don't have a permission, you cannot profit from your cover. If you have a permission, you have to pay royalties for your cover to the original author if you're exploiting your cover commercially. Weird Al does song parodies, not covers. AFAIK the prevailing opinion is that his songs would be legally protected under fair use (whether released commercially or for free) but he typically gets permission from the artists as a courtesy.
    • Keyframe 13y ago
      You're right. It dawned on me once I have commented. Parodies are in different legal space, so I'm not sure about commercial exploitability of it. See my other comment, based on my experience, how regular covers are treated legally within EU.