Saturday, January 26, 2013
I’m a longtime closeted beatboxer. I do it while walking around, doing household tasks, in the shower, pretty much anywhere except in front of other people. My wife is remarkably tolerant of it, bless her, and my infant son has no choice but to listen to me do it. I don’t expect to ever beatbox [...]
This post is longer and more formal than usual because it was my term paper for a class in the NYU Music Technology Program. Questions of authorship, ownership and originality surround all forms of music (and, indeed, all creative undertakings.) Nowhere are these questions more acute or more challenging than in digital music, where it [...]
Filed in Composition, Copyright and Authorship, Key Musicians, Music, Music Business, Politics, Recording, Sampling
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Also tagged ableton, afrika bambaataa, amazing grace, amen break, authenticity, bach, beatles, beyonce, brian eno, classical, compulsory licensing, copyright, danger mouse, david shields, dj, dj earworm, dj premier, double dee and steinski, entropy, Evolution, fairlight cmi, fugees, girl talk, grandmaster flash, harold bloom, hip-hop, informationtheory, jay-z, jesse walker, john coltrane, jonathan lethem, linkedin, looping, marcus boon, mashups, memes, midi, missy elliot, mohawks, nas, nyu, originality, plato, plunderphonics, questlove, reason, Recording, remixes, richard dawkins, Sampling, sasha frere-jones, stravinsky, susan blackmore, theodor adorno, walter benjamin, william gibson
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Thomas Wuil Joo. A Contrarian View of Copyright: Hip-Hop, Sampling, and Semiotic Democracy. 44 CONN. L. REV. — (2012) As both a fan and a producer of sample-based music, I’m naturally sympathetic to Lawrence Lessig and the free-culture movement, a group of legal scholars advocating reforms to copyright law that would make it easier to [...]
Filed in Copyright and Authorship, Music, Music Business, Politics, Sampling
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Also tagged beastie boys, copyright, de la soul, DJ Kool Herc, george clinton, girl talk, linkedin, nyu, Politics, public enemy, Sampling
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Sunday, November 28, 2010
We conventionally place a high value on originality in music. But it’s been my experience that the desire for originality gets in the way of making music that’s actually good. The closer you are to your influences, the more definite and truthful your work is. The key to quality music is to blend together an [...]
Filed in Composition, Copyright and Authorship, Evolution, Music, Music Business, Politics, Recording, Sampling
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Also tagged academia, beach boys, beatles, biology, chuck berry, copyright, creative commons, Evolution, hall and oates, led zeppelin, marcus boon, memes, michael jackson, Sampling
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If I had to pick a single track to explain to an alien or time traveler what hip-hop is and why it’s so awesome, I think I’d pick “Nas Is Like.” Nas has a great flow full of powerful imagery, but what truly sets this track apart for me is DJ Premier’s production. It’s a [...]
Filed in Composition, Key Musicians, Music, Sampling
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Also tagged advertising, digging the crates, dj premier, eurythmics, hip-hop, kool & the gang, memes, michael jackson, nas, nineties, recursion, roxanne shante, sample maps, Sampling, steve miller, turntablism
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This post isn’t about Obama. I love Obama. I’m talking about a classic breakbeat, the opening few seconds of “Impeach The President” by the Honey Drippers, and the president in question is Nixon.
Filed in Composition, Copyright and Authorship, Music, Sampling
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Also tagged big daddy kane, de la soul, digable planets, digging the crates, drumming, eric b & rakim, funk, hip-hop, honey drippers, mick jagger, nas, nice & smooth, notorious big, Sampling, slick rick, soul, wu-tang
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This PBS Independent Lens documentary on sampling culture is a good one, and you can watch the whole thing on Youtube. Their resources and links page includes my Biz Markie blog post. Thanks Beautiful Decay for posting the videos. Part one:
Filed in Composition, Copyright and Authorship, Music, Music Business, Politics, Sampling, Software
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Also tagged a tribe called quest, audio editing, beastie boys, clyde stubblefield, computers, copyright, dance, dj, eighties, george clinton, hip-hop, Improvisation, james brown, jeff chang, looping, mashups, memes, michael jackson, Music, pro tools, public enemy, Recording, remixes, rock, Sampling
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Biz Markie. Who doesn’t love him? Our broken intellectual property system, that’s who.
Filed in Composition, Copyright and Authorship, Key Musicians, Music, Music Business, Sampling
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Also tagged copyright, criminal justice, digging the crates, fail, gilbert o'sullivan, hip-hop, looping, memes, Music, remixes, Sampling
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