distinctions need to be made re: sampling, replaying, and interpolating because the terms are often confused and/or misused.
sampling is re-using already-recorded lyrics as well as already-recorded music or both. many replay already-recorded music (or revocalize in the case of re-singing or re-rapping) instead of sampling already-recorded music/lyrics for two reasons: #1: legally replaying already-recorded music/lyrics is cheaper than legally sampling already-recorded music/lyrics; #2: some artists will allow their already-recorded music/lyrics to be replayed/sung/rapped in a new release, but will not allow it to be sampled here's a complicated example: mantronix records a song called "king of the beats" in which he chops up a ton of things and makes a medley. there aren't any credits. snap takes a snippet from "king of the beats" (one which i'm guessing was mantronix messing with bob james' "take me to the mardi gras"; you'd recognize this from the tone of the percussion; missy's "work it" samples run-dmc sampling bob james' "take me to the mardi gras"; anyway, i'm digressing; snap used the mantronix bit to form the instrumental basis for "the power"; they grabbed lyrics from a chill rob g acapella , rearranged 'em, and added new ones, as well as stealing chill rob g's flow-style and came up with "the power"; the proper credits for "the power" should have credited the beat as having been sampled from mantronix, the rap as being sampled from chill rob g, and also the rap as being an interpolation of rob g (because the new non-rob g lyrics were also in his style); unfortunately neither rob g nor mantronix got credited. despite rob g and his label winning a legal battle with snap (and this getting some money), rob g's career was ruined because his hardcore fans thought "the power" was a rob g song and thought he had sold out. the label then re-released the rob g album that contained the song that snap had sampled and interpolated for "the power" and, to make matters worse, added a "rob g version" of "the power" (against rob g's wishes). this version was basically snap's "the power" with a different (and out of tune) vocalist singing "I've got the power!" (it sounds dreadful). so the woman was replaying (vocaly) the original "the power"'s hook. complicated, innit? i'm figuring mantronix didn't put up a fuss because, even though he was sampled for "the power" not because that bit may or may not have originated from bob james (it's messed up too much to prove it either way), there *are* bits in that same song (and elsewhere) where mantronix did not mess things up enough to render the original unrecognizable; so he probably wanted to avoid potential hot water. why run dmc and bob james didn't get mentioned in the credits for the missy song, i dunno. interpolation is something similar to sampling and replaying in that the new piece (that contains the interpolation) is based on something that came before but different in that nothing is lifted or re-done exactly "as is": interpolation is doing a new piece based on the ideas/themes of something else, and, like sampling and replaying, applies to things other than music (for example, there is a mountain dew (soda/pop) tv commercial that interpolates a looney tunes cartoon sketch; ie it has live humans recreating a famous wile coyote scene from a cartoon; at the end of the tv commercial, it says in the small print at the bottom of the screen that it is based on themes created by loony tunes ie interpolation) nelly's rap in "hot in herre" is an interpolation of the funk classic "bustin' loose" ie nelly is rapping with the same flow as "bustin' loose" and quoting a smidgeon of the "bustin' loose" lyrics in his rap. thus the credit. but the neptunes, at least in that song, are not doing any sampling, replaying, or interpolation of "bustin' loose"'s music. the neptunes are involved with other songs that feature sampling/replaying/interpolate on occasion, however. one example i can think of is this one: they produced p.diddy's "d.i.d.d.y"; the title chant in "d.i.d.d.y" is an interpolation of bdp/krs one's "jimmy" (the way krs one says "the j the i the m the m the y...it's jimmy" is echoed in the same way in "d.i.d.d.y"); also there is a credit for eric b and rakim on "d.i.d.d.y" which could refer to p.diddy interpolating a bit of a rakim rap on "d.i.d.d.y" or perhaps the neptunes replaying or sampling a bit of an eric b beat and/or bdp beat. i've tried but haven't been able to figure out which it is. the confusing thing about credits is that though it might say "X" contains an interpolation of "Y" in the credits, it doesn't say whether it is the music or the lyrics or both from "Y" that are being interpolated in "X"; and it is even more confusing when, instead of saying in the credits what is sampled, what is replayed, and what is interpolated, there is just a long line of names in the credits. some hip hop and r n b songs these days have literally ten or more names in the credits because there is so much sampling and replaying and interpolating going' on. take a look at the credits on those sampling hip hop classics in an attempt to be "street" (jennifer lopez is a good example of this) and the credits are a mile long. say bob james is sampled in a production by dj premier, the credits would be premier/james, then if another hip hopper sampled that premier beat, it would be newartistcredits/premier/james, if j.lo does a song that samples the second song, interpolates another, samples another, etc, plus credits herself and the producer of her "song", you've got one heck of a long list. another example: the rob base and dj ez-rock loop from "it takes two" that got used in a ton of songs back then and even again recently in a mario j. (some bad boy artist that's young) remix was actually a sampling, replaying, and interpolation of "think" by lynn collins. doesn't help when artists don't fess up. the beatnuts were *not* sampled for a j.lo track, for example, despite what they say. what happened is the beatnuts sampled but didn't credit an artist on one of their tracks. j.lo's producer then replayed the hook from a beatnuts song; the beatnuts, of course, didn't want to say "j.lo's producer replayed the hook from one of our songs where we sampled someone else and didn't give credit"! despite the higher number of samples that get cleared these days, there is still a ton of uncredited sampling going on that people do notice (especially when a couple of bars from the originally are lifted wholesale; i still don't understand why led zeppelin has never sued any of the thousands that have and continue to use the drum break from "when the levee breaks" as that, along with the schooly d 808 break, tons of breaks from james brown tracks, and the incredible bongo band continue to be used--again to this day--nonstop and uncredited), but it's the replaying and the interpolation that happen a lot more often and, because they are easier to get away with, don't get credited when they should, mainly cos they're harder to prove. the last case i know of is the rolling stones having to compensate kd lang because their "has anybody seen my baby?" is an interpolation of her "constant craving". the media went on and on about the stones sampling kd lang, but it's an interpolation. back to the neptunes: the instrumental for busta rhymes' "light yo ass on fire" is, in my opinion, an homage to kraftwerk's "metal on metal"; but there isn't any sampling or replaying and it would be a stretch to say it is an interpolation, despite the similarity in tempo and the metallic feel. yes, i know, i know, all of the above is quite anal (so no need to flame me :)), but i've always had a fascination with production and writing credits, whether i like a song or not. i'm just full of often useless information! i can sit around for hours as blab about credits, so i'll stop now; enough from me for now, i've got a toothache. andrew duke (can't remember which list this thread originated on, thus am sending to 3 to cover the bases) out now: Environmental Politics http://and-oar.org Take Nothing For Granted http://acidfake.tk Sprung http://bip-hop.com http://warprecords.com/mart/music/release.php? cat=BLEEP12&fc_type=CD *Canadian electronica album of the year nominee* More Destructive Than Organized http://staalplaat.com Highest Common Denominator http://pieheadrecords.com Physical and Mental Health http://dialrecords.com 74'02 (split with Hypo) http://tsunami-addiction.com Waveforms: Halifax Electronic Music Compilation http://cognitionaudioworks.com
