Déjà vu.

I remember listening to “Can I Kick It?” for the first time and being amazed not just by the ATCQ lyrics, but by that amazing bass line that permeated throughout the track song.

It was only a few months later, when I was playing the song at a friend’s place and his dad brought out a Lou Reed LP, that I realized that the bass line was a sample; this discovery led me down a road of sample exploration, trying to unearth all the samples found in some of my favorite songs at the time. (In the pre-internet days, that research wasn’t as easy as just going to whosampled.com or a similar site.)

When I learned that the theme for the recent edition of The Mixtape Concern would be déjà vu, I immediately knew that it would be an opportunity to re-explore the art of the sample. For my submission, this month, I present a playlist of some fun songs I love to listen to, coupled with tracks that they sampled, either subtly or overtly.

Track list:

1. Me, Myself & I, De La Soul / (Not Just) Knee Deep, Funkadelic
2. One More Time, Daft Punk / More Spell On You, Eddie Johns
3. Regulate, Warren G & Nate Dogg / I Keep Forgettin’, Michael McDonald
4. Push It, Salt-N-Pepa / You Really Got Me, The Kinks
5. Fun, Fun, Fun, The Beach Boys / Johnny B. Goode, Chuck Berry
6. Manic Monday, The Bangles / 1999, Prince
7. Cameo Lover, Kimbra / Be My Baby, The Ronettes
8. Tiny Little Bows, Carly Rae Jepsen / Cupid, Sam Cooke
9. Swoon Units, Digable Planets / Lady Marmalade, LaBelle
10. Can I Kick It?, A Tribe Called Quest / Walk On the Wild Side, Lou Reed

Access the playlist on Spotify here.

→ Mixtape