Samplerism

I have been chopping and gathering sample age materials for a couple of months now heavy. Immersing myself in obscure, popular and traditional vinyl records. Not only am I getting awesome musical parts, but also good drum sounds, rhythms and grooves. In taking this different musical approach I have learned valuable things.

1. The music back in the ‘day’ was a lot simpler. The emphasis was on groove, melody. A story was being told, in rhythm and in lyrics.
2. In the simplicity is the true beautiful rhythm and groove. From the structure of the song, the simple melodies played. All in a fat sequence to be pleasing to the listener.
3. The lyrics weren’t about things of super negative connotation. True there were songs with a dark undertone, songs with sadness. But they were never usually about ‘killing’ someone, pimping a hoe or poaching a NARC.

I feel like I am in music school listening to these albums while sampling them. The likes of Sergio Mendez and Brazil 66’, Strauss, James Bond soundtracks, Liz Story, Liberace, Billie Holiday just to name a few. It is teaching me song structure, pleasing rhythmic nuances and to just have fun.

I am glad I am taking this approach to music. It has humbled me greatly in this aspect I’ll tell you about. I used to look down upon, frown upon artists who would heavily sample. Hip hop artists, electronica artists, those who did cover songs. I guess I frowned upon it because I didn’t understand it. I didn’t fully grasp the real art that it is. Listening to all of these records I realized one thing, plagiarism and cover songs, riff lifting and such was apparently heavy in the fifties/beyond just like it is today. Then diving deeper into musicology through vinyl, I come to realize that even classical artists from today’s generation and back in the day generation borrowed heavily from each other whether they knew it or not. So I beg a question. Is it ethical for me to be doing this? Does God approve? To be basing my beats and songs around lifted string riffs, lifted musical portions. Manipulating them into new arrangements with new twists. Is it? Why not, if done with a pure heart. If said samples are giving credit to the original artists. Maybe, if the song you have done is banging and the listener looks further into the song and sees where the sample came from, a thought might pop in their head to listen to the original rendition. Then the listener is now exposed to new forms of music, from possibly before their time, and they are enlightened to an age not much different than what we are in already. I may never know if God truly approves, but I know if my heart becomes cold with success, hard and deceitful. Then that is where a definite disapproval will ensue. Then another question appears. What is the difference between lifting a sample with a pure heart for artistry, and the multitude of cover bands doing their renditions? Is it the ‘clearance’ and ‘asking artist approval’ aspect? I think the clearance thing is a sticky situation. We all start on the bottom, unknown. When we as artists are ‘coming up’ we don’t have the luxury of having direct access to the original artists if alive. A good face to face conversation to iron out use of said lifted samples with the original artist is not plausible. Once again, I feel that if credit is given, and a good heart is present than if you have success you might talk to the artist at that time, which I think is when said conversation should happen.

I guess I bring all of this up after seeing and hearing for years the disapproval of samplers, samplists and cutters/choppers. I see the points brought against them as moot, and not truly valid. It is almost as if we all sit on high horses, overlooking the true artistry in this world we live in. While yes, there are those who would sample and deny, there is a multitude who do it for the love of sound.