I’ve almost driven off the 405 twice. Once was because I blinked for a really long time. The other time was because of a song on the radio. It was a hip-hop song driven by a sample. The sample was “Baby Come Back,” by Player.
Yes, that same cheez-tastic ballad that is more famous for depicting apologetic mops in Swiffer commercials than being a well-remembered song in good taste. Despite the dubious standing of the song itself, Chicano rapper and pride of San Diego (read: San Diego’s only native rapper) Lil’ Rob thought it a fitting source material to craft the bouncy little love jam “Let Me Come Back” about asking for forgiveness, effectively rehashing the sentiment of “Baby Come Back” itself.
I’m not scandalized by the rehashing, but by the choice of sample itself, and the time period that the sample comes from, which I think is a sign of things to come.
First of all, let me get it out of the way that I love sampling in hip-hop. This is a technique that was and is the lifeblood of hip-hop. The idea that you can take something old and make something new with minimal equipment is central to hip-hop. You get some of your pops’ old records, cut them up, rap over them, and you have a new song. Set this process against a backdrop of urban poverty and you’ve got a bona fide art and aesthetic movement of creative people working with what they have.
Since its humble beginnings as a DJ spinning two drum breaks at the same time, hip-hop has (obviously) grown into a cultural juggernaut and a billion-dollar business. Due to this transformation, it has certainly lost some of its “old-to-new” aesthetic and moved away from sampling and towards more synthesized material.
This transition is due mainly to one reason: expedience.
As investigated by Spin magazine in an article that came fairly close to declaring the death of sampling, samples have become harder and harder to work with due to ridiculously stringent copyright laws that make sample clearance an arduous process.
I can’t really blame anyone, because people are entitled to their fair share if their melodic or rhythmic ideas get reused. But because of this, a lot of mainstream hip-hop releases have been delayed due to sample clearances (see Saigon’s ““ remember him on “Entourage”? ““ as-yet unreleased album “The Greatest Story Never Told,” which may at this point never be told) or steered more toward original, synthesized productions.
For example, on T.I.’s platinum album “Paper Trail” only three out of 16 songs contain samples, and on Young Jeezy’s gold album “The Recession,” four out of 18 songs contain samples. Compare this to Notorious B.I.G.’s 1994 classic “Ready To Die,” in which all but one of the 19 tracks contain samples.
I realize that this discrepancy between the rap albums of an earlier era and today are due to the natural evolution of hip-hop into the mainstream and greater subsequent scrutiny by copyright authorities, but I also believe that today’s sampling woes are driven by producers breaking an unwritten law of sampling: You have to dig.
Crate digging is a rite of passage for any young producer or DJ, or as the case may be now, internet digging. In other words, it’s searching for usually obscure, rare or interesting songs that you might use professionally in a DJ set or in a hip-hop beat. As hip-hop grew, the art of sampling became more diversified, with producers shying away from previously used samples, like the drum break from James Brown’s “Funky Drummer.” As a result, it has become somewhat of an unwritten law that your sample should be unique and somewhat obscure.
Because today’s producers are breaking with this tradition, it seems to be causing the sample slowdown. If you pick a really obvious sample like “Baby Come Back” or “Every Breath You Take,” you’re going to have some serious legal wrangling to do with Sting’s camp. And those are the songs that did make it to their respective albums. I can’t imagine the songs that never got released due to legal firepower. If producers stepped their game up and really dug for their songs, there’s a chance that the legal side of things could be streamlined.
The other side of things that this sample illuminates is that the songs that are being sampled are getting younger. When hip-hop started out, it was all about songs from the ’60s and ’70s being sampled: Brown, Al Green, Willie Hutch, The Jackson 5, etc. That trend continued well into the ’90s because that’s what the artists of the ’90s grew up with: the music of the ’70s.
Now, that trend is slowly devolving. More current songs are being sampled as well as older songs from later decades. For instance, T.I.’s posse cut “Swagga Like Us” samples M.I.A.’s 2007 song “Paper Planes.” And Slim Thug’s new song “I Run” almost comically employs “I Ran” by A Flock of Seagulls. So it’s not so much about the songs they grew up with anymore, because I doubt that Slim Thug grew up listening to A Flock of Seagulls.
On one hand, it seems like the samples being used are growing gradually younger, but it also points to laziness on the part of producers who want a big hit right now. And if you want a big hit, why not sample a big hit? Producers are capitalizing on previous associations with the songs, instead of really creating something new. In 1994 DJ Premier sampled a silent film score from the 1920s to make a hip-hop classic, Nas’ “Represent.” Since then, it seems like creativity in sampling has all gone downhill.
But if Just Blaze can flip a Romanian pop song into a No. 1 hit with T.I.’s “Live Your Life,” there’s still hope for hip-hop.
If your jaw dropped when you heard “Live Your Life” for the first time and then promptly tired of it after Power 106 played it three times an hour, then e-mail Ayres at jayres@media.ucla.edu.