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January 28, 2014 Andy Cush

Sampling has been an integral part of Western music for decades, from the French musique concrète composers of the 1940s, to the introduction of commercially available instruments like the Mellotron and the MPC, to today, with Beyoncé using Star Search intros and snippets of TED Talks in her songs and Jay Z and Kanye lifting from Blades of Glory . In […]

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June 20, 2013 Andy Cush

Each week in Sample Wars, we’ll pit two songs which sample the same source material head-to-head against each other, to determine which one rocked the sample better. Between a new single, a new album coming (we hope), and an awesome rebuff to those who dismissed her last record, M.I.A. seems poised for a full-on comeback. In […]

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March 28, 2013 Andy Cush

Each week in Sample Wars, we’ll pit two songs which sample the same source material head-to-head against each other, to determine which one rocked the sample better. As you may have heard, Harmony Korine’s Spring Breakers dropped this month. As a tribute to the sartorial inspiration for James Franco’s Alien, we’re deconstructing one of RiFF RAFF’s best love […]

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February 21, 2013 Andy Cush

Each week in Sample Wars, we’ll pit two songs which sample the same source material head-to-head against each other, to determine which one rocked the sample better. Today, we look at The Chakachas’ “Yo Soy Cubano,” a song that provided sample fodder for two wildly different tracks: Kendrick Lamar’s “Backseat Freestyle” and “Magic Carpet Ride” […]

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