Reworking Musical History: Jazz, Soul, and Hip Hop Samples

music_phantom13 · 05-04-2014, 09:15 PM

Well, I'm back on mob tonight after years astray. I was a somewhat active user 4 or 5 years ago, and just saw that an old journal of mine is still here. My musical taste has changed pretty drastically sense then so it seems fitting to start something new rather than revive an old partially finished and no longer accurate top 100 albums. Back then I was getting far too caught up in keeping up with all the new pitchfork type music coming out and downloading everything I saw on musicbanter; I listened to tons of music but I actually managed to make one of my favorite things become stressful - i was trying to hear everything and ended up not spending enough time to really get to know must of it.

Somewhere along the way I got fed up with it, deleted a bunch of stuff, and took some time to discover the music that I truly love. I kept getting drawn back to hip hop and rap. Then, one day, I was learning to play Aurarian Dance by Nujabes and found that he sampled Laurindo almeida's the lamp is low and it struck me that I loved this music largely based on sampling but had no idea where it all came from, and I started finding new things, which led to my current musical loves of soul and jazz.

So with this new journal, I'd like to write about some soul and jazz songs by looking at hip hop hat has sampled them. I know mb doesn't, or at least didn't in the past, have that many members into these genres, but hopefully you guys will find it interesting.

Trollheart · 05-05-2014, 06:10 AM

We're always happy to see new journals and new musical perspectives here, so welcome.

I know exactly what you mean though about something you love turning into something you hate, or more accurately perhaps, your hobby becoming like work. I used to work on my single journal to the extent that I would have up to FOUR entries PER DAY EVERY DAY. After a while it became a chore and I had to sit down and give myself a proper talking-to, after which I realised hey, it doesn't matter if I miss out a day, or even a week updating: this is MY journal and nobody will tell me off if it's not updated every single day.

Since then I've become much happier in what I do, although some might say I've gone back to how I was, with now currently SIX journals, though not all of them are updated regularly. Still, I enjoy myself much more now and can put more genuine effort into my journals than I did when I had to "force myself" to update.

So kudos to you for realising the way things were going. Looking forward to your first entries.

Oh and may I say, although I don't know you I'm sure many here do, so welcome back.

**Goofle** · 05-05-2014, 08:41 AM

Ahh this sounds great. Will definitely be checking your posts out.

Silenzio · 05-05-2014, 10:39 AM

First of all, nice to meet you!

To be honest, I was impressed by the title: Reworking Musical History. So that's why I actually read this!
Your attitude towards music seems to be mature. I'm very interested in hearing your opinion on music.
I admit, I'm not hip-hop or literate but I think your journal must be quite educational for that reason!

music_phantom13 · 05-05-2014, 03:13 PM

Thanks for the encouragement guys! I'm honestly surprised at the interest. One quick question for mb - how do people here feel about sampling? I've found very mixed opinions about it where some feel that it shows a lack of creativity

Anyways, to begin I'll start with the song that really kicked off this musical journey of mine.

Nujabes - Aurarian Dance

Laurindo Almeida - The Lamp is Low

You might recognize the Nujabes song, through his music or Samurai Champloo, and this is one of my favorites by him. I don't think Laurindo Almeida is quite as popular, and almost certainly not here on mb. I was learning to play Aurarian Dance on the guitar years back, and I started to wonder where he was getting the melody from so I tracked down the sample. I still love Nujabes and his chill sounds, but I discovered that he pretty blatantly rips off a lot of stuff for his music. On the plus side, if you like his music then tracking down the samples will definitely introduce you to some new music that you already know you'll enjoy.

I absolutely love both of these songs. While Nujabes' is very similar, his relatively simple beats drive the song forward without affecting the very relaxed and upbeat feel of the original. I found that he is quite skilled as well at blending the beats together - you can still hear the percussion from The Lamp is Low, but he puts a snare, hi hat, and kick overtop that matches up perfectly. As someone who enjoys messing around with sampling and making beats myself (though I'm quite bad) I can really appreciate the difficulty of capturing that vibe just right. Also the slightly slower tempo and repetitive looping lends Aurarian Dance a bit more of a calm relaxing vibe. Laurindo Almeida's cover of The Lamp is Low has a lot more of the orchestration occasionally heard in Aurarian Dance, and I find that it gives his song a much more dreamy feel.

His song is a cover of the original, which I think was just a popular song written by a French guy in the 1930s . I'm not sure if The Lamp is Low would be considered a jazz standard, but it's been covered by a lot of great musicians who put some interesting takes on it; I don't want to fill this page with too many youtube videos and some I can't find online, but Oscar Peterson and Ella Fitzgerald have good versions, as well as the Harry James Orchestra aka the band that kicked off Frank Sinatra's musical career.

Silenzio · 05-06-2014, 02:02 PM

Sampling is reusing a part of a piece by another artist, so basically you could say it's not your self-created work.
I think there are positive and negative sides, sampling is perhaps a sign of lack of creativity, but on the other hand it can't be so easy to use the other well.
For example Yann Tiersen used Sage Francis' melody of best of times in his song The Trial (Skyline). Now I'm a fan of both artists, only because the perfect sampling!

Thanks for your examples and recommendations, I didn't know about those artists, no, but I will definitively catch up!
With that specific song by Laurindo Almeida I associate vintage-movies. Amazing orchestral work, the level must have been very high.
The Nujabes version is pure beauty sound-wise, but quite different ambient-wise. Inspiring!

music_phantom13 · 05-06-2014, 04:18 PM

Thanks! And yeah I understand where people have a problem with it I was just curious what people thought on mb. I obviously love sampling and have no problem with it, I love seeing the different ways people come up with to reuse old music and how different the results can sound.

Anyway, I covered Aurarian Dance and how this became an interest, so I'll be focusing on famous classic hip hop songs for the time being. To kick things off:

Gangstarr - You Know My Steez

Sampled

Joe Simon - Drowning in the Sea of Love

You Know My Steez has been a staple to most of my hip hop playlists for years now, and it's definitely up there near the top of my favorite hip hop songs. The lyrics are just Guru talking himself up, completely righteously so, and he's got some awesome rhymes in here - "I'm like the minister when I be lacing the wax I be bringin salvation through the way that I rap". Premier's beat is sick as well but you might not have expected it came from a pretty laid back blues/soul song. He really takes that short intro loop and turns into something new, chopping off bits and pieces of the notes here. He gets the feel of the song perfect as well, one of the things I love about his beats, keeping it pretty laid back and chill but just enough aggressiveness to fit Guru's rhymes. The Joe Simon song is definitely great as well. I do find his voice slightly offputting - he's got that deep gravelly voice but somehow it's a bit nasally at the same time, but it's just a minor annoyance. He makes a pretty good mix of blues, funk, and soul. The music in the verses is calm and chill with blues guitar riffs flitting around, plus those awesome horns. The chorus brings back in the soaring orchestral bits we all know from soul music, courtesy of MFSB. Lyrics are pretty depressing which makes an interesting sort of foil to the upbeat music of the chorus, lines like "All I do is cry, all I do is walk around and cry, but right now I'm drowning, oh I'm drowning in the sea of love". The song's been sampled by Ghostface Killah too on Not Your Average Girl ft. Shareefa which is good, and also by Da Beatminerz on Drama but to me the latter song just feels like a rip off of Gang Starr.

By the way, I have very little knowledge of what other people know about soul and jazz as I don't know many people that listen to it so sometimes I might say things that aren't well known facts and I apologize if that's the case. But MFSB, if anyone was wondering, was the house band for Philadelphia International Records and played on albums by big name groups like The Spinners, Teddy Pendergrass, and Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes. MFSB defined that smooth funk sound of the label and if it sounds familiar you might recognize them from this little single that they released as a band:

05-04-2014, 09:15 PM	#1 (permalink)
music_phantom13 Music Addict Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Pittsburgh, PA Posts: 942	Reworking Musical History: Jazz, Soul, and Hip Hop Samples Well, I'm back on mob tonight after years astray. I was a somewhat active user 4 or 5 years ago, and just saw that an old journal of mine is still here. My musical taste has changed pretty drastically sense then so it seems fitting to start something new rather than revive an old partially finished and no longer accurate top 100 albums. Back then I was getting far too caught up in keeping up with all the new pitchfork type music coming out and downloading everything I saw on musicbanter; I listened to tons of music but I actually managed to make one of my favorite things become stressful - i was trying to hear everything and ended up not spending enough time to really get to know must of it. Somewhere along the way I got fed up with it, deleted a bunch of stuff, and took some time to discover the music that I truly love. I kept getting drawn back to hip hop and rap. Then, one day, I was learning to play Aurarian Dance by Nujabes and found that he sampled Laurindo almeida's the lamp is low and it struck me that I loved this music largely based on sampling but had no idea where it all came from, and I started finding new things, which led to my current musical loves of soul and jazz. So with this new journal, I'd like to write about some soul and jazz songs by looking at hip hop hat has sampled them. I know mb doesn't, or at least didn't in the past, have that many members into these genres, but hopefully you guys will find it interesting.

05-05-2014, 06:10 AM	#2 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,992	We're always happy to see new journals and new musical perspectives here, so welcome. I know exactly what you mean though about something you love turning into something you hate, or more accurately perhaps, your hobby becoming like work. I used to work on my single journal to the extent that I would have up to FOUR entries PER DAY EVERY DAY. After a while it became a chore and I had to sit down and give myself a proper talking-to, after which I realised hey, it doesn't matter if I miss out a day, or even a week updating: this is MY journal and nobody will tell me off if it's not updated every single day. Since then I've become much happier in what I do, although some might say I've gone back to how I was, with now currently SIX journals, though not all of them are updated regularly. Still, I enjoy myself much more now and can put more genuine effort into my journals than I did when I had to "force myself" to update. So kudos to you for realising the way things were going. Looking forward to your first entries. Oh and may I say, although I don't know you I'm sure many here do, so welcome back. __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

05-05-2014, 10:39 AM	#4 (permalink)
Silenzio Music Addict Join Date: Oct 2013 Location: Austria Posts: 210	First of all, nice to meet you! To be honest, I was impressed by the title: Reworking Musical History. So that's why I actually read this! Your attitude towards music seems to be mature. I'm very interested in hearing your opinion on music. I admit, I'm not hip-hop or literate but I think your journal must be quite educational for that reason! __________________ Sometimes the - silence - guides your mind.

05-06-2014, 02:02 PM	#6 (permalink)
Silenzio Music Addict Join Date: Oct 2013 Location: Austria Posts: 210	Sampling is reusing a part of a piece by another artist, so basically you could say it's not your self-created work. I think there are positive and negative sides, sampling is perhaps a sign of lack of creativity, but on the other hand it can't be so easy to use the other well. For example Yann Tiersen used Sage Francis' melody of best of times in his song The Trial (Skyline). Now I'm a fan of both artists, only because the perfect sampling! Thanks for your examples and recommendations, I didn't know about those artists, no, but I will definitively catch up! With that specific song by Laurindo Almeida I associate vintage-movies. Amazing orchestral work, the level must have been very high. The Nujabes version is pure beauty sound-wise, but quite different ambient-wise. Inspiring! __________________ Sometimes the - silence - guides your mind.

05-05-2014, 03:13 PM	#5 (permalink)
music_phantom13 Music Addict Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Pittsburgh, PA Posts: 942	Thanks for the encouragement guys! I'm honestly surprised at the interest. One quick question for mb - how do people here feel about sampling? I've found very mixed opinions about it where some feel that it shows a lack of creativity Anyways, to begin I'll start with the song that really kicked off this musical journey of mine. Nujabes - Aurarian Dance Laurindo Almeida - The Lamp is Low You might recognize the Nujabes song, through his music or Samurai Champloo, and this is one of my favorites by him. I don't think Laurindo Almeida is quite as popular, and almost certainly not here on mb. I was learning to play Aurarian Dance on the guitar years back, and I started to wonder where he was getting the melody from so I tracked down the sample. I still love Nujabes and his chill sounds, but I discovered that he pretty blatantly rips off a lot of stuff for his music. On the plus side, if you like his music then tracking down the samples will definitely introduce you to some new music that you already know you'll enjoy. I absolutely love both of these songs. While Nujabes' is very similar, his relatively simple beats drive the song forward without affecting the very relaxed and upbeat feel of the original. I found that he is quite skilled as well at blending the beats together - you can still hear the percussion from The Lamp is Low, but he puts a snare, hi hat, and kick overtop that matches up perfectly. As someone who enjoys messing around with sampling and making beats myself (though I'm quite bad) I can really appreciate the difficulty of capturing that vibe just right. Also the slightly slower tempo and repetitive looping lends Aurarian Dance a bit more of a calm relaxing vibe. Laurindo Almeida's cover of The Lamp is Low has a lot more of the orchestration occasionally heard in Aurarian Dance, and I find that it gives his song a much more dreamy feel. His song is a cover of the original, which I think was just a popular song written by a French guy in the 1930s . I'm not sure if The Lamp is Low would be considered a jazz standard, but it's been covered by a lot of great musicians who put some interesting takes on it; I don't want to fill this page with too many youtube videos and some I can't find online, but Oscar Peterson and Ella Fitzgerald have good versions, as well as the Harry James Orchestra aka the band that kicked off Frank Sinatra's musical career.

05-06-2014, 04:18 PM	#7 (permalink)
music_phantom13 Music Addict Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Pittsburgh, PA Posts: 942	Thanks! And yeah I understand where people have a problem with it I was just curious what people thought on mb. I obviously love sampling and have no problem with it, I love seeing the different ways people come up with to reuse old music and how different the results can sound. Anyway, I covered Aurarian Dance and how this became an interest, so I'll be focusing on famous classic hip hop songs for the time being. To kick things off: Gangstarr - You Know My Steez Sampled Joe Simon - Drowning in the Sea of Love You Know My Steez has been a staple to most of my hip hop playlists for years now, and it's definitely up there near the top of my favorite hip hop songs. The lyrics are just Guru talking himself up, completely righteously so, and he's got some awesome rhymes in here - "I'm like the minister when I be lacing the wax I be bringin salvation through the way that I rap". Premier's beat is sick as well but you might not have expected it came from a pretty laid back blues/soul song. He really takes that short intro loop and turns into something new, chopping off bits and pieces of the notes here. He gets the feel of the song perfect as well, one of the things I love about his beats, keeping it pretty laid back and chill but just enough aggressiveness to fit Guru's rhymes. The Joe Simon song is definitely great as well. I do find his voice slightly offputting - he's got that deep gravelly voice but somehow it's a bit nasally at the same time, but it's just a minor annoyance. He makes a pretty good mix of blues, funk, and soul. The music in the verses is calm and chill with blues guitar riffs flitting around, plus those awesome horns. The chorus brings back in the soaring orchestral bits we all know from soul music, courtesy of MFSB. Lyrics are pretty depressing which makes an interesting sort of foil to the upbeat music of the chorus, lines like "All I do is cry, all I do is walk around and cry, but right now I'm drowning, oh I'm drowning in the sea of love". The song's been sampled by Ghostface Killah too on Not Your Average Girl ft. Shareefa which is good, and also by Da Beatminerz on Drama but to me the latter song just feels like a rip off of Gang Starr. By the way, I have very little knowledge of what other people know about soul and jazz as I don't know many people that listen to it so sometimes I might say things that aren't well known facts and I apologize if that's the case. But MFSB, if anyone was wondering, was the house band for Philadelphia International Records and played on albums by big name groups like The Spinners, Teddy Pendergrass, and Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes. MFSB defined that smooth funk sound of the label and if it sounds familiar you might recognize them from this little single that they released as a band: