You are allowed to release a cover of almost any song that has been commercially released, and the songwriter cannot stop you. That is not a loophole — it is written into US copyright law as a compulsory licence. What you owe is a mechanical licence and the royalty that goes with it. The complications are all in the video.
The one sentence version
Recording and releasing an audio cover requires a mechanical licence, and the owner is obliged to grant it. You do not need permission, you do not need a relationship, and you do not need to find anybody. You need to pay the statutory rate and obtain the licence through the normal channel.
This applies to songs that have already been commercially released in the US. If a song has never been released, that compulsory right does not exist and you would need actual permission.
Streaming only: your distributor probably handles it
For a cover going to Spotify, Apple Music and the rest, the composition mechanicals are paid by the streaming services themselves under a blanket licence. Your practical obligation is whatever your distributor requires.
Most of the main distributors ask you to flag a release as a cover during upload and take care of the licensing themselves, some for a small fee. Flag it. Uploading a cover as though it were your own composition is the thing that actually gets releases taken down, and it is the most common mistake on this whole subject.
The song's real writers should also be credited correctly in the metadata. That is not a legal nicety — it is how the money finds them, and it costs you nothing.
Downloads and physical copies: the actual number
If you are selling downloads or pressing anything physical, you owe the statutory mechanical rate per copy. For releases on or after 1 January 2026, that rate is 13.1 cents per unit — up from 12.7 cents — or 2.52 cents per minute for songs running over five minutes, whichever is greater.
You buy that licence through a service like Harry Fox's Songfile or Easy Song. Expect a processing fee in the region of $15 to $20 on top of the royalty itself, and note that you are licensing a quantity in advance — a hundred copies means you pay for a hundred copies.
Rates are set by the Copyright Royalty Board and change. Check the current figure before you calculate anything you are relying on.
Video is a different licence, and it is not compulsory
This is the part that catches people. A mechanical licence covers audio. Filming yourself performing the song is a synchronisation licence, and sync is not compulsory. The copyright owner can simply say no, or name a price, and that is the end of it.
In practice, YouTube resolves most of this without anybody asking. Its Content ID system identifies the composition and diverts the advertising revenue to the rights holder rather than to you. The video stays up and you do not get paid — which for most cover videos is an acceptable trade, and it is what is already happening to nearly every cover on the platform.
What you cannot safely assume is that the same arrangement covers you elsewhere, or that a monetised channel, a paid course, or an advert is treated the same way. The further the video gets from 'someone playing a song on the internet', the more it matters.
What you are not allowed to change
A compulsory mechanical licence lets you make your own arrangement, but it does not let you fundamentally change the character of the song. Rewriting the lyrics, changing the melody substantially, or turning it into a different work takes it outside the compulsory licence and back into needing real permission — which is also true of a parody unless it clears a rather specific legal bar.
Change the feel, the tempo, the instrumentation, the key. Do not change the song.
None of this is legal advice. It is a songwriter's summary of how the licensing works, and anything with real money attached is worth twenty minutes of an actual lawyer's time.
Flag it as a cover when you upload. The takedowns almost always trace back to somebody who did not.
Three pages on this site that carry it further: the whole royalty map, getting it distributed once it is licensed, and how sync licensing works from the other side.
Check Your Specific Situation
Cover questions are all edge cases — a live video, a mashup, a song from another country. Describe yours to the assistant on this site and it will talk you through what applies.