looney tunes

This is a very funny video of Korean soldiers upon a surprise visit by Girls Generation. I found this on 9gag trending btw =)




Now that you have cbf'd clicking above video, lets talk about something interesting about the music industry.

Sampling. The greater the artist you sample, the more people are going to hate you if you fuck it up. I have listed 5 incidences of sampling from 1 being awesome, 2 being pretty epic, 3 being okay, 4 being hardly acceptable, 5 being pure asshole-ry. I don't care if it doesn't go down linear, it can be a logarithmic scale =P


1) Eminem samples Dido's "Thank You" in "Stan"
Both amazing songs. I like that it was only her vocals sampled (simple but elegant creds), with a new beat + backing, and nicely credited in the title too. And the great thing is that what makes the song isn't the hook, it's the buildup and the ending. If you haven't heard Stan before you'd need to open the lyrics up beside it cos in the drunk verse Vevo makes it sounds like "See Slim? Shut up ___ I'm trying to talk, _____ ___ _-______-_, but i __ ____ i just __ ___-" etc.

2) Daft Punk samples Edwin Birdsong's "Cola Bottle Baby" in "Harder Better Faster Stronger"
I listened to Cola Bottle Baby and was like "BUT THIS IS THE ESSENCE OF HBFS!" It's quite interesting hearing the original source of this funky ass riff. Now obviously a good deal of Daft Punk songs are sampled seeing as they are DJ's and not singers/guitarists. I included this to be fair to Kanye down there. Others include Robot Rock -> Release the Beast (Breakwater); Digital Love -> I Love You More (George Duke); Crescendolls -> Can You Imagine (Anthony and the Imperials). I just found those out by Googling I didn't actually know of those other songs :L

3) Kanye West samples Daft Punk's "Harder Better Faster Stronger" in "Stronger"
There's a heated argument between Daft and Kanye fans in the comments and it's hilarious. 3&4 was a tossup between Stronger and (SPOILERS FOR NEXT SONG ->) Me Love. While Stronger sounds better, it is clear that the HBFS hook is what makes the whole song. Me Love, while it sounds slightly lamer, only samples the vocal melody of D'yer Mak'er, and while it may not have gotten famous without the sample, it wouldn't sound like complete ass. Then I watched the 2008 Grammy where Daft Punk supported Kanye West. I didn't see a similar for Led Zep/Sean Kingston. So Stronger wins.

4) Sean Kingston samples Led Zeppelin's "D'yer Mak'er" in "Me Love"
Led Zeppelin is like fucking legend. Even if you don't like their music, you still respect it. Because it's motherfucking Led Zeppelin and it's holy.
Okay, I'll be honest, Me Love's not BAD. But it sure as hell ain't good. And when you sample Led Zeppelin, you're bound to piss off a lot of people. Hell, the comments now are still hate from Led Zeppelin fans.
For reasons stated above, this loses to "Stronger".
Also, Daft Punk is awesome, but Led Zeppelin is legendary. So that tipped the scales too.

5) Vanilla Ice samples "Under Pressure" in "Ice Ice Baby"
It's Queen. Like, Under Pressure, by Queen. Then you put "Ice Ice Baby" onto it. I have no words.
Surprisingly there are no hate comments from Queen fans right now, though there is one smug comment about how Vanilla Ice was sued for stealing the riff (a story which I doubt greatly, as ownership of creative material in the music industry is very hazy beyond DRM).
Next, rap is shit if all you do is say "I'M AT A FUCKING PARTY" or you whine about how you can't get laid. Unfortunately that is also about 80% of all rap written. Ice Ice Baby falls into that 80%.
Cue hate from Glee fans (Gleeks, right?) who will buy anything that comes out of that show. And wtf I was listening to this and you can clearly hear the autotune in the spoken part at the end. They are not even trying.


BEFORE I LEAVE - I have a special band.
This one is like -3. Does everyone remember the Rogue Traders? And their 3 biggest hits - Voodoo Child, Watching You, In Love Again? Check out the song "Pump It Up" - Elvis Costello, "My Sharona" - The Knack, and the bridge of "Head Over Heels" - Tears for Fears. The only one that resembles some sort of non-heavy reliance on tried and tested riffs is Voodoo Child, which only uses one of the riffs over and over. But the rest of them shameless lift key ideas from other songs.