My understanding was that it's ok, unless the band in question has said that you cant use their songs etc. (except for listening, of course ).
However, if you DO, you MUST give credit to the band and their record company (you can find most of these just by a quick search).

If I'm wrong, please correct me though, as I don't know for certain.

L.D

Generally speaking... you need their written permission to use their music, period. It doesn't matter if they're "just a garage band" or whatever- they still have rights to their work, and can shut your mod down (as well as being a danger to TLR, if they distributed your mod).

Otherwise, you're ripping off their rights to their work.

There aren't any ways around this, really- copyright law here is pretty cut-and-dried. The only good news is that the chances of being sued over it are pretty low- usually you're going to get your mod project shut down first. But if you really screw up, or your mod becomes very popular and gets noticed by the MPAA... you could get TLR shut down, which would kind've suck. I'm not saying it's likely (several major mods downloadable from here use music they don't have the rights to)... but it's possible.

So... if you're unable to get the permission of the musicians or their publisher (usually such things must be negotiated with their publisher)... then you're basically in a position where anything you release is going to be illegal, just like trading in MP3s of music you didn't pay for.

If I were you... I'd look around on MP3.com for bands that:

A. Don't suck.
B. Aren't signed.
C. Are willing to let you use their music.

Can you tell me if the following bands will allow it:

Breaking Benjamin
Shinedown
Crossfade
Disturbed
Demon Hunter
Halo/Halo 2 Soundtrack
Evanescence
Justifide
Linkin Park
Trapt
Creed
Daft Punk
Kutless
Skillet
P.O.D. (aka. Payable on Death)

Help would be appreciated here. If these guys don't allow it, I'll just keep the music mods to myself (not illegal since I'm not sharing it =D)

Find those bands online and write them an email I found the first three's websites within a few seconds of Googling them- most bands have a website these days.

This is a difficult question to answer.
Argh is right about the copyrights.
In general we don't post mods that have commercial music in them unless the author of the mod sends us a copy of the permission they obtained.

A few may have slipped by.
We have had trouble in the past so I suggest if you want to add music that you get permission...which should be the general rule in anything you do...if you want to use something that you didn't do yourself or don't belong to you, shouldn't you ask permission?...if for no other reason then to show respect and keep things legal.

Can't send the mod unless it is in peices. It is so big (994 megs!) that FLMM can't handle it (FLMM freezes) and Hotmail puts a 10 meg limit on attachments. I would have to send it in peices and someone would have to edit the files manually in order to make it work (I know because I did it).

Just a dumb question on my part...what could possibly make your mod that big?
Tons of music files?
It wont be worth the effort of sending it if:
1. you didn't get permission for the music.
2. the mod crashes.
a. I cant post it if it don't work.

Lately we have been using sendthisfile to send large files because there is something wrong with our FTP Server.

The copyright stuff was nagging at me, I was just going by what I had heard (why I hadn't posted a small pre-release to a mod). however getting a reply from bands IS probably quite unlikely, as no doubt they get hundreds of emails every day, and the chances of them seeing yours is fairly low...

The size is due to the fact that I am not using files like those that shipped as in-game music. Each is around 40 megs (all CD audio). Since the mod crashes in FLMM, I have decided to go straight into the files and replace it all manually. If someone wants to do these for themself (not illegal if the CD is purchased by you or given to you permanently), go into the files like this:
My Computer->C Disk->Progam Files->Miscrosoft Games->Freelancer->Data->Audio->Music.
That will get you there. All files you want to play must be in WAV/WAVE format. Also, you must rename the song to the same name as the one you are replacing (I found these things on my own =D). It works because I have done it before.

This thing works awesome! Battling to actual Rock music, what a good change!

Download Wavepad and save the files as .wav format with 56kbps mp3 encoding...Voila! Small files

Does it work in MP3 format?

Nope, all music files (maybe sound too, havnt checked) must be in .wav format

Thought so. I knew WMA didn't work, hence my 5 music converters.