Hi everyone,
To cut a (very) long story short, music sampling goes way back, but since the birth of Hip-Hop, sampling has become a much more prominent feature of the musical landscape.
If you were a music fan in the 1980s, you’ll probably remember the legal case of “Ice Ice Baby” by Vanilla Ice vs. “Under Pressure” by Queen & David Bowie, or maybe you recall when The Verve lost out to the Rolling Stones in 1997 after a battle over their hit “Bitter Sweet Symphony".
Even in 2020, controversies over samples flare up all the time. Justin Bieber was accused of stealing a melody earlier this year by another artist, but it turned out that it actually came from a royalty-free sample—Switched On Pop podcast has a very interesting episode titled “What Happens When Justin Bieber Samples Your Music” in which they interview the producer who created the original sample.
The world of sampling is far too complex to go into on today’s blog post, so let’s instead share some songs which include some interesting samples
Did you know that “Panini” by Lil Nas X sampled ‘In Bloom’ by Nirvana?
How about “Whatcha Say” by Jason Derulo sampling “Hide And Seek” by Imogen Heap?
Santana’s 1999 song “Maria Maria” was sampled by Rihanna & DJ Khaled on “Wild Thoughts”:
Or do you remember that “California Love” by 2Pac Feat. Dr. Dre sampled “Woman To Woman” by Joe Cocker which came out back in 1972?
Recently, while listening to Sour Candy from Lady Gaga’s new album I had a feeling that I’d heard it before. After a quick search, I discovered that it uses a sample from a track released back in 2010 by Maya Jane Coles, which in turn has been sampled multiple times by artists including Tinie Tempah and Zara Larsson on the song Girls Like in 2016, and on Swish Swish by Katy Perry in 2017.
So, what do you think of songs that use samples? Or multiple songs using the same sample? Share your thoughts, plus your favorite examples in the comments below