With a back catalogue valued higher than the GDP of France, or something, Jacko has never been in a rush to clear samples, unlike his broke-ass contemporaries. Well, at least that rule applied in the 80’s. If you’d have tried to clear the bassline from ‘Billie Jean’ last year you might have even kept some of your publishing. So, as we mourn MJ’s passing but realise it would have simply been wrong for him to have not died before his time, we look back at how his music influenced hip-hop. Don’t get excited though, only a handful of artists dared or succeeded in clearing samples, but the ones that did were classics. As for his inspiration as a whole? Well, we could have done without Pharrell’s singing and Kanye deluding himself that he will be as important as MJ some day. We’re also grateful MJ didn’t allow himself to be too accessible to rappers in general. Aside from a guest verse from Heavy D and features by Jigga and Eve on the odd remix, the Hip-Hop fraternity never got a real chance to get a piece of him. Let’s see what his new Akon produced album has to offer though. Please don’t let them get any old 3rd rate spitter on a multitude of remixes. Let’s face it though, without MJ, Hip-Hop or Black music wouldn’t be the far reaching commercial force it is today (not exactly a great thing, we know), especially considering the barriers he broke down at MTV. Anyway, we’ll let some doofus ruminate on that in this weekend’s broadsheet glossies. Until then, we’ve omitted anything by Derek B, MC Hammer and most R ‘n’ B. We’ve only focused on substantial usage and omitted any uncleared samples apart from Scram Jones as that’s the whole point of the post. We’ve basically omitted any crap but feel free to school us, this is all goodness baby…
Billie Jean (Thriller, Epic 1983)
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Scram Jones ‘Jackson Jacker’
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Ice Cube ‘You Know How We Do It’ (check the drums)
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Thriller (Thriller, Epic 1983)
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Biz Markie ‘Mudd Foot’ (the famous Vincent Price laugh)
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Large Professor ‘Mad Scientist’ (there’s that laugh again)
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I Can’t Help It (Off The Wall, Epic, 1979)
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De La Soul ‘Breakadawn’
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Off The Wall (Off The Wall, Epic, 1979)
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Chubb Rock ‘Enjoy Yourself’
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It’s Great To Be Here (Maybe Tomorrow, Motown, 1971)
Eric B & Rakim ‘Eric B Is On The Cut’ (sample first used on 12″ by Afrika Bambaataa on Death Mix but Eric and Ra cleared it officially)
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Original Concept ‘Can You Feel It’
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Puff Daddy ‘All About The Benjamins’ (Puff saved the best bit for Biggie’s verse)
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ABC (ABC, Motown, 1970)
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Naughty By Nature ‘O.P.P.’ (famously Jacking Tony D’s use of the sample on his track ‘Adam’s Nightmare’, see our Tony D posts HERE)
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Heavy D ‘The Overweighter’ (the first one to use this…)
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Heartbreak Hotel (Triumph, Epic, 1980)
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Heavy D ‘Peaceful Journey’ (The Hevster obviously had an inside connection)
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Human Nature (Thriller, Epic, 1983)
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Nas ‘It Ain’t Hard To Tell’ (Large Pro killed it with this one)
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SWV ‘Right Here’ (We had to include this)
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People Make The World Go Round (Ben, Motown, 1972)
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Mobb Deep ‘Apostles Warning’
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Naughty By Nature ‘World Go Round’
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With A Child’s Heart (Music & Me, Motown, 1973)
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Big Punisher ‘You Ain’t A Killer’
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P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing) (Thriller, Epic, 1983)
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Kanye West ‘Good Life’ (’Ye smashed it with one, clever usage)
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Rock With You (Off The Wall, Epic, 1979)
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De La Soul ‘Cool Breeze On The Rocks’ (short but sweet)
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14 responses so far ↓
1 keeno // Jun 29, 2009 at 7:21 am
Not technically a direct sample, but The Prodigy used the Thriller Baseline ni a track.. danm can’t remember the name.
nice one for uploading these though! top listening!
2 yesyses // Jun 29, 2009 at 10:33 am
pete rock used off the wall on robo and de la stay away.
3 brian beck from wiscompton // Jun 29, 2009 at 12:44 pm
Breakadawn is the one for me. Just a perfect rap song.
As far as uncleared joints go, then it’s all about the o.g version of Swang by Trae & Hawk.
4 End Level Boss // Jun 29, 2009 at 6:26 pm
Good post.
5 Jay-G // Jun 30, 2009 at 12:59 am
Which MJ track did Mc Lyte sample on the Sunset Park soundtrack?
6 End Level Boss // Jun 30, 2009 at 5:39 am
You missed LL Cool J – Hey Lover / MJ – Lady In My Life.
7 End Level Boss // Jun 30, 2009 at 5:52 am
To Jay-G. It was Liberian Girl.
8 Video Thunder // Jun 30, 2009 at 1:49 pm
Really Really good post. Crazy extensive.
9 don king // Jul 1, 2009 at 4:31 pm
Was Jay-Z – ‘Izzo’ on the list of omitted crap?
As for Akon producing the new MJ stuff….oh dear.
10 Dan Large // Jul 1, 2009 at 6:00 pm
Izzo’s in Part 2
11 nak // Jul 2, 2009 at 8:30 am
You forgot Biggie rapping (ripping) on a MJ track!
12 MCEctoCooler // Jul 5, 2009 at 9:34 am
GREAT post. A lot of us don’t realize how many popular rap songs sample the great michael jackson! Here’s a video compilation of the top rap songs that sample MJ. Some songs don’t appear on your list , you’ll be surprised! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJB55hMlHQY
13 pristyles // Jul 7, 2009 at 10:07 am
did you see this: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ethanhein/3409364883/sizes/o/
14 Mercilesz // Jul 20, 2009 at 2:26 pm
whoah whoah whoah….ENJOY YOURSELF WITHOUT DANA DANE THIS BE THE DEF BEAT…YALL R SLIPPPPPPPIIIINNNNNN
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