Thoughtful Sampling

My favorite thing about hip-hop is the art of sampling music. I've always enjoyed discovering when someone sampled an older song. Often it is a careless process and artists will sample a piece from a song that is not unique, maybe too fresh in our head from its original piece, and overall not very creative. The type of sampling that I enjoy most is when you hear artists sample a piece that is very subtle and takes many listens to discover its origin. I think within a genre of music that doesn't rely on traditional instruments, its really important to test your creative abilities, and step your creativity game up a notch. Hip-Hop is often dismissed because many think it is not creative, due to its lack of traditional instruments. I feel that the people whom dismiss hip-hop completely are overlooking what exactly goes into quality of production in that genre of music. A lot of what goes into creating a beat for a hip-hop/rap song is more in the style of researching older music of all genres and piecing together something unique. If you are patient enough to filter out the abundance of bad hip-hop out there, there truly are some gems. Some songs that I love that have used great samples are..

"Forever Begins" by Common, off the album Finding Forever. The drum line from this song is from Paul Simon's "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover". I love samples of like this because it is two artists from such different styles and the producer was able to use music of a completely different genre and turn it into hip-hop art.

"It Ain't Hard To Tell" by Nas, off the Album Illmatic. I guess you could consider it the chorus of this song, when you can hear Michael Jackson's voice sampled from his song "Human Nature". Right away you can tell that the sample is Michael Jackson, but its such a small piece that it doesn't give away the actual song that is sampled instantaneously.

"Gone" by Kanye West, off the Album Late Registration. The piano and backup sampled Vocalist is Otis Redding from the song "It's Too Late". These are just two incredible songs, and Kanye did such a great job in not over doing the sample. Many artists will more or less record over an original song, adjust it very slightly, and act as though it was a sample, when I would call it something more like theft.

Sorry for my absence over the past two weeks. I'll step it up and get more articles out. Thanks for reading!!!