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FM Studio Steem Sessions ~>
It took me a bit to truly bounce back, and this past Sunday I thought I would be ready to revitalize my Sunday Steemit Sessions (S3). Well here we are and it's already Tuesday. So you know what, I'm simply going to change the Sunday Steemit Sessions .. into Studio Steemit Sessions. This way, I can release music whenever I feel inspired, and as I'm locking the audio video side of these posts down, I can hopefully be uploading more than once a week moving forward.
So onward with the Studio Steem Sessions!!
Ghetto Samba 2
This is a song I wrote in or around 2003. Before I address the instrumental I want to talk about hip hop. I have been into hip hop since I was a child and independently finding my own tastes for music. I grew up in the 80's when hip hop was pioneering as a culture. Now we can get into issues like appropriation, or cultural appropriation, and it's connections to sampling music, or I would argue the natural historical progression of all forms of music from that which came before, mixed with the ever changing fore-front of leading consciousness adding it's own flare and input into the mix. Hip Hop is exactly that from it's conception.
Now where sampling is concerned, my personal opinion is that hip hop sampled, borrowed, emulated, incorporated, altered and remixed anything and everything that spoke directly to the soul. Hip Hop is soul music in my opinion. Hip Hop is unique in that it openly paid tribute and homage to that which inspired it's architects most. Kool Herc was djing the records that both inspired him personally, and that he felt would get the local Bronx demographic the most hype at those early block parties. But Kool Herc wasn't broadcasting all of his vinyl gems to the world (the crowd) like Casey Kasem's top 40 countdown. Hip Hop had ingrained within it's swag and intrigue, mystery and suspense. Everyone might know that fresh break beat, but not everyone can place where that catchy riddem came from originally. There was a cat and mouse game to it, like hide and seek. Just as dj's had to go on a record digging quest to find those hidden, and not so hidden gems, the public too, was not to be rewarded too quickly without the same passion for knowledge, funk and truth.
Record digging isn't and wasn't about disrespecting, plagiarizing or infringing on the creative rights of any artist. It was a form of reverence and recognition. Of course there are exceptions to every rule, but the foundation and spirit of all the elements of hip hop are based in morality, creativity and high character. Until Vanilla Ice tried to deny the obvious 8 bar sampling of Queen's "Under Pressure," the greater part of America wasn't even privy to the developing corporate interest and subsequent ramifications for commercialized sampling and the large profits that were now understandably becoming an issue concerning creative "rights." In my opinion, it's sort of like the way the government described porn, (even though I don't agree with their conclusion about what to do with porn .. different topic lol), in that it's hard to completely define on paper, but you know it when you see it. I think it's the same with sampling, you can tell when someone has no honor, or is stealing someone else's idea, or is profiting off other's backs and not doing right by the due acknowledgment and/or compensation. And for the record, those types of people are schmucks in my opinion.
But I do love the mystery and yet historical archiving that is very unique to hip hops relationship with every genre of music. I don't think every thing that hip hop has nurtured in it's history with blending, appropriating and innovating music should be blatantly put on the table, dissected and sterilized for every type of person to understand, literally, historically, and intentionally. I like how long it took me to realize and connect the dots of so many songs, samples, sounds, quotes and otherwise that hip hop has exposed me too. If the Beastie Boys had to reference every artist, idea, sample, style, look etc etc that the flawlessly incorporated into what is now undoubtedly uniquely distinct to the Beastie Boys sound, we would not only be here forever, we would take much of the fun diversity and mystery away from a perfect formula that is the sum total of a rad group called the Beastie Boys.
So I respect not only creative and property rights, I also respect and honor steemit's goal to keep everything on the up and up. No plagiarizing or biting someone else's work, idea, writing or styles .. got it, of course, check. And then I was going to post this song I wrote way back to a Stan Getz joint that I loved. And then I was like, well sh!t, that's pretty straight up hip hop, and yet it is an instrumental where I sampled the whole joint for an homage tribute remix track I was inspired to do. Annnd in hip hop fashion, you'd want people to dig, or have the beat peak their interest enough to ask, and create intrigue, interest, dialogue, connection, conversation etc etc. I also have no problem recognizing the Artist and the actual song I sampled, so here's where credit is due. It's the second version of the song Ebony Samba 2 taken in it's entirety. And while I used to play it out all the time, it never made any release album because of the copyright challenges. I recently just started picking out old music to play live that I haven't played in years, and this was one of those songs. And for anyone wondering, the only female vocalist you hear in the original song is the lovely Astrud Gilderto.
For the record, the lyrics I dropped on this song were written at least 15 years ago. Anybody who knows me in the real world .. please know this track has nothing to do with any current events in my life. There's no hidden or implied jab at anyone I know within the last ten years, and like many of my songs is both about specific and generalized people, places and ideas. But this is not about any crazy woman I know from Colorado. There I said it lol. Trust me, I have new songs about all that chaos, and they are self evident in that the lyrics aren't ambiguous at all. Soo, be on the lookout for all the upcoming studio steemit sessions.
One Love!
all music, pictures, graphics and video footage by McAD aka gentlesouljah *except [Beastie Boys](http://natefullerart.blogspot.com/2012/03/beastie-boys-ryhmin-and-stealin-i-got.html)
Additional music at Rhymes4theTimes.com