Current Events > How is Scrubs like, the only show with fucked up music?

(+) Yeah! (+)

This obviously isn't the first time a show has gone from airing on a network to airing on streaming.

Yet it seems to be the only show I've ever heard of that had to rework their music due to copyright.

Can someone explain

A.) How a company can obtain license to stream the entire show but have that license somehow NOT be inclusive of the show's music?

B.) If there are any other cases like this

C.) What all the "removed" music has in common with each other (like is all removed music owned by the same label or some shit)

I just don't understand it

There's a few shows like that....

Off the top of my head:
Freaks and Geeks
The Wonder Years (NOTORIOUS for this problem and why it wasn't released on DVD for a long time)

I can't answer your technical questions though, sorry.

It's not at all

House notoriously is missing its excellent opening credits music on streaming platforms. Instead they just replace it with the much less memorable closing credits music.

Scrubs is a weird case because a lot of their licensed music is still intact, IDK why those particular songs are missing. Especially because a handful of really good scenes are almost ruined by the bad replacement music.

The State had to redo all their music too. Its not the same.

Streaming and even dvd sales werent considered in a lot of older shows. They would sign contracts with license owners for broadcast and syndication rights but would remain silent on other methods of re-airing content. So it allows the license owners to renegotiate or ban usage of their property.

MC_BatCommander posted...

House notoriously is missing its excellent opening credits music on streaming platforms. Instead they just replace it with the much less memorable credits music.

Scrubs is a weird case because a lot of their licensed music is still intact, IDK why those particular songs are missing. Especially because a handful of really good scenes are almost ruined by the bad replacement music.

funny thing is a few random episodes had the original theme when I did a partial rewatch a year ago. Like maybe 5% of them.

Drew Carey Show

Married With Children had to replace its theme song for a while

But like

They can play Don't Stop Believin' in S3E2
But not the Sanford and Son theme in Turk's head
But they CAN play the Jeffersons theme song Movin' On Up when he's banging Carla in like S2
but they CANT play How To Save a Life with lyrics in My Lunch

it just seems like they drew names from a hat as to which had to go

If they wanted, could Hulu like, license JUST the missing stuff if they wanted? (It would never happen, I'm just wondering if they COULD legally)

a lot of shows with copyrighted/licensed music typically also have an "evergreen" version, which is an edit cut without the copyrighted music that isn't able to be licensed past their agreed upon time of use. this is all agreed upon when the show is in production and has nothing to do with the streaming services.

it's very common in television.

90s era Charmed lost its intro music when it hit streaming.

Shows like Muppet Babies and Kidd Video are probably lost to time due to music and video clips.

Daria sufferers from this same issue.

Miami Vice had that problem years and years ago supposedly, but thankfully they sorted everything out and everything is on the DVDs as far as I know.

Stuff like this is one of the few legit reasons to rip and copy stuff so the originals can be preserved.

PatrickMahomes posted...

But like

They can play Don't Stop Believin' in S3E2
But not the Sanford and Son theme in Turk's head
But they CAN play the Jeffersons theme song Movin' On Up when he's banging Carla in like S2
but they CANT play How To Save a Life with lyrics in My Lunch

it just seems like they drew names from a hat as to which had to go

If they wanted, could Hulu like, license JUST the missing stuff if they wanted? (It would never happen, I'm just wondering if they COULD legally)

wtf. Thank god I have seasons on DVD cause my lunch without the fray would lose sooooo much of its pull.

The original release of Supernatural has a soundtrack that makes the Netflix release soundtrack look like straight up trash.

I don't know but I hate scrubs

Supernatural got all of the copyrighted soundtrack music changed on Netflix, including the show's Signature Song, "Carry on Wayward Son" by Kansas.
The Drawn Together episode "Dirty Pranking No. 2", does a Dirty Dancing parody and uses "(I've Had) the Time of My Life" as part of that parody. Reportedly, the songwriter was infuriated at seeing his song used in this fashion and refused to negotiate video rights to it. The DVD version of the episode replaces it with an original song making fun of the situation.
The Season One DVD set for Profiler is missing Episode 4. Why? Because the episode featured the song "Every Breath You Take."
All That airs on NickRewind without the musical guest performances. Since this necessitates the additional removal of sketches introducing the guest, and the cast saying goodbye onstage after the song, several episodes end abruptly.
One of the biggest examples is with Wiseguy, which excises an entire season from DVD releases because of its dependence on licensed music.
Everybody Hates Chris is filled with licensed music, most of which comes from the era the show takes place in. For a time, 70% of Season 1's episodes remained missing from streaming services, Hulu in particular. With the emergence of Peacock, the missing season 1 episodes were reinstated on both services, but with generic soundtrack music to replace the licensed songs. The captions on Hulu still retain the lyrics from the songs that were replaced, however.
In reruns and streaming copies of 30 Rock, the subtitles state different songs than what is played because of copyright. For example, in the episode "Jack The Writer," Tom Jones' "She's a Lady" played in the original broadcast, but "Who's that Lady?" by the Isley Brothers plays in later prints.

Beverly Hills 90210 has about 100 episodes missing from Hulu because of music licensing from Peach Pit After Dark performances. Also, syndicated and DVD releases have generic music replacing iconic tracks, Brenda and Dylans breakup scene is the most impacted. That show got hit worse than any other in history.

Zeeak4444 posted...

wtf. Thank god I have seasons on DVD cause my lunch without the fray would lose sooooo much of its pull.

it's still okay with just the instrumentals but yeah it still takes away from it

Wait what I just checked on Hulu and the vocals are there

There is a scrubs podcast with Zach and Donald. They had Bill Lawrence on and I believe he said (and this is from memory so might be slightly inaccurate) that Scrubs didnt have a huge budget and to save money they didnt pay for the full licensing like most shows do

A_Good_Boy posted...

Daria sufferers from this same issue.

This

Guy love

Conception616 posted...

Beverly Hills 90210 has about 100 episodes missing from Hulu because of music licensing from Peach Pit After Dark performances. Also, syndicated and DVD releases have generic music replacing iconic tracks, Brenda and Dylans breakup scene is the most impacted. That show got hit worse than any other in history.

Two episodes that always sticks out for me is

Season 1 the have a slumber party at the Walshs and the dance to Do You Love Me (Now that I Can Dance?) and Mrs Walsh dances with the girls, and it was replaced by a generic pop instrumental on DVD

And either season 2 or 3 when Brandon goes on a date with a girl and they head to a club. I believe it may be the episode he crashes Mondale. The song Hippie Chick by Soho plays at the club. I only remember that one because my sister LOVED that song when it came out, so this, in turn, became one of her favorite episodes.

The Super Mario Bros Super Show usually had a cover song in the episodes, but they all got removed later for rights reasons.

It really sucks, because the songs were often the highlight of the episodes, and they just get replaced with generic score.

Examples of the cover songs.

https://youtu.be/b-E8LYJFiP8?t=260

https://youtu.be/OedmjHDcCNw?t=180

Malcolm in the Middle had this problem for a long time too right? Not sure if they figured that out recently.

bigblu89 posted...

Two episodes that always sticks out for me is

Season 1 the have a slumber party at the Walshs and the dance to Do You Love Me (Now that I Can Dance?) and Mrs Walsh dances with the girls, and it was replaced by a generic pop instrumental on DVD

And either season 2 or 3 when Brandon goes on a date with a girl and they head to a club. I believe it may be the episode he crashes Mondale. The song Hippie Chick by Soho plays at the club. I only remember that one because my sister LOVED that song when it came out, so this, in turn, became one of her favorite episodes.

Im actually on season 10 in my annual binge, so Im not totally sure on the second one it was so long ago, but he definitely wrecked Mondale in season 1 episode B.Y.O.B., where Steve was making Mucho Mahvelous Mango Margaritas lol.

MC_BatCommander posted...

Wait what I just checked on Hulu and the vocals are there

oh i might be on drugs then

Xerun posted...

There is a scrubs podcast with Zach and Donald. They had Bill Lawrence on and I believe he said (and this is from memory so might be slightly inaccurate) that Scrubs didnt have a huge budget and to save money they didnt pay for the full licensing like most shows do

makes sense

The Japanese reality TV show Terrace House has a bunch of awesome licensed music in it but when they put the episodes on Netflix they replaced all the cool songs with boring generic stuff because I guess it was too much of a hassle to pay for licenses again or something

Part of the problem is that music licensing is far more expensive now than in the early 2000s and earlier. So studios arent willing to renegotiate licensing at todays prices.

The most egregious song change in Scrubs is when JD and Elliot fuck while shes staying at his apartment for Christmas. It had Dreaming of You by The Coral, and now its some shitty song with annoying horns.

Capitalism at work

But really, shit like this is why piracy exists

Did I say piracy? I meant "preservation"
>_>

MC_BatCommander posted...

House notoriously is missing its excellent opening credits music on streaming platforms. Instead they just replace it with the much less memorable closing credits music.

Scrubs is a weird case because a lot of their licensed music is still intact, IDK why those particular songs are missing. Especially because a handful of really good scenes are almost ruined by the bad replacement music.

I haven't seen Scrubs since the music thing but I can imagine. One of the best parts of that show was its use of music

radical rhino posted...

The most egregious song change in Scrubs is when JD and Elliot fuck while shes staying at his apartment for Christmas. It had Dreaming of You by The Coral, and now its some shitty song with annoying horns.

I liked that scene and song :(

Daria also had this huge problem where it just use licensed music due to being on MTV and then became a problem for DVD and streaming releases

even WWE has this issue when they upload stuff from WCCW or ECW due to the music being copyrighted, like The Sandman's theme being Enter Sandman or New Jack's theme, which does play during his matches most of them, being Natural Born Killers by Ice Cube and Dr. Dre and even Heyman admits they never got the rights to the songs to use to begin with

Remember when Rockstar released patches that removed songs from some GTA games?
And if I remember right, there is a song that was only included in the first PS2 version of GTA3.

Fairly infamous example: Evangelion on Netflix doesn't have Fly Me to the Moon.

Adventures of Pete & Pete has this problem :(

SMAP- posted...

Adventures of Pete & Pete has this problem :(

they even had all the season 3 DVDs printed too :(

A_Good_Boy posted...

Daria sufferers from this same issue.

Dude, after I got the whole series for streaming and started watching. I realized I did watch for the music. I found bands and songs I liked cause of Daria. I still love the show but it feels a bit soulless in some moments.

Luckily the movies kept their music.

The music industry is a fucking horrible. If you pay for a song to played on your TV show or game that should be it. One time fee, it over.

Nobody has mentioned Cold Case yet so I'll explain

it was on cbs years ago. It was your typical cop solving murder show. But dealt with old crimes. Sometimes from decades in the past . The show would always feature music from the very year of the murder. It had a very expensive soundtrack I think. But they only paid for television broadcast song rights. The show never got released on DVD, I think at least partly because of this issue

I believe it may be on some streaming service now. I think I saw it somewhere but don't remember where. But never tried watching it and don't know what the music is like

Punished_Blinx posted...

Malcolm in the Middle had this problem for a long time too right? Not sure if they figured that out recently.

I definitely remember MitM having this issue as well. I'm sure it meant there was never a full DVD release and it's why it took years to come to streaming as well.

MitM is also fun because it was recorded in 16:9 with the intention to crop it down to 4:3. While that is not exactly rare, Netflix somehow how their hands on the original 16:9 masters and used it for their HD streams. This resulted in some strange scenes with content that was originally never meant to be seen. Like one scene is about how all chairs are taken in the classroom and the uncroped video shows many empty chairs.
Or standins that you only see part of the head of in the cropped version suddenly turns into new kids randomly sitting at the dinner table.

RetroGamer68 posted...

MitM is also fun because it was recorded in 16:9 with the intention to crop it down to 4:3. While that is not exactly rare, Netflix somehow how their hands on the original 16:9 masters and used it for their HD streams. This resulted in some strange scenes with content that was originally never meant to be seen. Like one scene is about how all chairs are taken in the classroom and the uncroped video shows many empty chairs.
Or standins that you only see part of the head of in the cropped version suddenly turns into new kids randomly sitting at the dinner table.

that's actually hilarious