Ok..here is my rant for the day.

Two of the new artist on Clear Channels new artist page have sampled the same damn song for their first single. Letoya Luckett's "Torn" and Mila J's "Complete" both sample "You Are Everything and Everything Is You."
http://clearchannelmusic....phop.html#

It's beyond ridiculous the amount of sampling that goes on in R&B music. The sampling has got to stop. Is it that difficult to market original music anymore?

"You Are Everything" has already been sampled to death, nevermind 2 new singles.

CinisterCee said:

Mary J's "You Are My Everything" comes to mind.

Can you imagine both of those songs charting at the same time? They are basically the same song...same sample, similar lyrics and both sung by whispering pop tarts.

PurpleCharm said:



Do the original artists get royalties when their work is sampled?

1FRO said:

Of course, what is this 1986?

Anybody notice Prince's protege Tamar on that page?

PurpleCharm said:

Yes, it's difficult because no one studies OR practices their keyboard scales or chords anymore.

Anything is done by ear. But even THIS practice has been reduce to making beats and that's all.

How sad.

Rick James spoke about this a few years back. He was asked how he felt about the current state of music. He basically said that he didn't blame the youngsters but faulted the education system which has basically taken music out of the curriculum.

What trips me out is when the newbies cite legends as their influences, yet their music doesn't reflect the greatness of the legends. I clicked on Mila J's home video on the link above and she cited Prince as one of her influences. She even claims that her first concert was Purple Rain. I kind of find that hard to believe because she doesn't look older than 18 and the Purple Rain tour was 22 years ago.
[Edited 7/15/06 15:43pm]

PurpleCharm said:
True. In the school district in which I live, elementary students have music once a week, middle school students 45 minutes every other day, and high school students zilch with the exception of band which most kids drop out of to pursue other extracurricular activities.

1FRO said:

As a former D.J., I have my own thoughts on sampling. If you are going to use someone else's music, first u must pay them and give credit where it is due. I also believe in using some creativity. For example, I remember when Beyonce's "Crazy in Love" dropped, the horns come from an old Chi-lites" song called, "You are my Woman". She utilized that sample in a clever way. Unlike the way other artist use samples, hers made you think. It made you asked yourself,"I know that I have heard that before, but where"? Artist like Letoya and and Mila J, their producers and their record companies, have one thing in mind....Money!! They feel, "Let's join the trend of putting some familar music,(hopefully, the artist that we got it from is dead) behind some half-assed song. This way, it is sure to get radio play and bring in the dollars. This shows a lack of creativity on all concerned. It also shows, contrary to popular belief, that there ARE artists who are only in it for the money. This is why it is important that schools offer music education, like my school did. I attended a school that taught me what a movement in a piece is, what a sample was, etc. It makes me laugh and sad all at the same time, when my little nieces and newphews hear a song and think that it is a new song. I then go to my record collection and pull out the original....the looks on their faces.

Most sampling in hip-hop, because that's the genre in which the technique's roots lie, I don't mind so much, but sampling in R&B (yes, even the hip-hop brand that's omnipresent now), which was always traditionally based on real instruments and original composition? Lazy bullshit that needs to die.

EDIT: Yes, for what it's worth, there is some hip-hop sampling I personally can't stand, like the samples in G-funk and some of pop-rap.
[Edited 7/15/06 15:33pm]

I think it's part of the overall "Hip Hop takes over R'n'B" scenario.

Todays R'n'B is basically nothing else than Hip Hop with sung elements and shorter raps.

I personally don't see any sense in making one genre of music sounding almost exactly like another one - isn't the sense in having more than one genre of music that you can get different kinds of music?

Counting the minutes until vainandy joins...

EmancipationLover said:

!

shorttrini said:

Well said.

I don't mean to be a stickler... But technically those songs aren't samples,,, Sampling is when you steal a small snippet of an ORIGINAL songs, loop it over and over and rap/sing over it, such as Hammer's "Can't touch this". And they can "steal" xx amounts of it, ( forget how many seconds), and not have to pay the original artist. What these no-talent broads are doing is simply ripping off a well known melody, using synths or other instrumentation, of tunes familiar in people's minds to make a hit more easily, such as Mary J. Bliges "My life", (which does both actually)! Both are pathetic to me, and both is why I hate most rap/r&b these days.... No originality and no musicianship!

sdekm1 said:

Thanks for the clarification.

I agree, no originality and no muscianship.

sdekm1 said:

Wrong!

I don't know where anyone got this myth of "per second" sampling but it's just not true and it never was. All lawsuits back in the day never dealt with "hey that group sampled me for THIS MANY SECONDS", it was just about proving original intellectual property just like any other copyright lawsuit.

CinisterCee said:

I looked it up, and your right! The courts did rule that the SAMPLER, cannot use ANY part of the SAMPLEE without permission, with ONE exception.... If the Sampler uses his own equipment to recreate or alter the sound of the SAMPLEE, he can get away with it... http://publishing.wsu.edu...copyright/ (Scroll down to the "Music Sampling" section.... Any way I also read from people like James Brown and George Clinton that if they tried to sue everyone that rips their stuff... They'd be in court forever.... It's really sad.

Side question: who the FUCK is "Mila J"???

CalhounSq said:

lol totally. apparently someone of unfounded popularity or buzz yet will be shoved down our throats

PurpleCharm said:

There are beatmakers that will namecheck Prince as a big influence. Beside the music itself, they're also Prince-fans because of the way THIS artist was using technology in his music (Read: 1999 album).

They also namecheck Prince for the way he used to write his lyrics too (Read: Dirty Mind).

music has been sampled for years now. This is nothing new.

1FRO said:

I'm pretty sure only the songwriters and the owner of the recording (usually the record label) get paid for a sample. So if the artist didn't write the song then I doubt they are getting anything from it. The brilliant musicians involved in the original recording will never get anything out of it either. Another area where the artists/musicians get exploited by the labels...

This is one reason why I am done with today's R&B: too much damn sampling! It's beyond ridiculous.There was a time when only the rappers used to do all the sampling and that was understandable,since none of them are real musicians anyway.But it's really,really sad to see real musicians like Jam and Lewis sampling like crazy.Why can't people come up with real melodies anymore?

squiddyren said:

Exactly! I remember several years ago,Angie Stone was being hailed as some great new artist.But nearly every song she put out was based on a sample of an old R&B hit! I was like,wtf?!

1FRO said:

and you can blame Ronald Reagan for that.In the 80s,he cut back funding for music in schools.That's why,in the 90s and beyond,you see so much damn sampling and not enough real musicianship.

Here's the scariest thought though...If the majority of what's popular today is just regurgitations of what's already been done...what the hell is it going to be like in say 10-20 years? Can you imagine this crap being regurgitated?

SexyBeautifulOne said:

Kinda sad when you think about it,huh I'm gonna stick to my 70s music!