Illmatic Samples - Life's A Bitch/The World is Yours

Life's a Bitch was AZ's spectacular introduction to the world and he killed it on the track. Nas' father, Olu Dara also collaborated with Nas on the song for the first time.

Life's A Bitch was produced by L.E.S.



The beat for the song was sampled from The Gap Band's Yearning for Your Love.

The Gap Band - Yearning For Your Love -

Real Soul. Real Hip Hop.

The World is Yours

This is my favorite joint off Illmatic. It was produced by Pete Rock.

This is the same song Jay Z sampled on Dead Presidents where he later dissed Nas about how 'you made it a hot line/I made it a hot song.'

Nas ft Pete Rock The World Is Yours
Uploaded by oublierleracismeskyblog

I'm out for dead presidents to represent me...

The World is Yours samples an the voice of T La Rock on his song Its Yours.



It also samples jazz pianist, Ahmad Jamal's I Love Music. I couldn't find a video for this one but I found something you should love. It starts off with the Nas sample from Ahmad Jamal and then some other great samples. Enjoy.



Look for tomorrows installment where we will continue the Illmatic series with One Love.

Illmatic Samples - NY State of Mind

This month we're gonna take a look at some samples from classic albums starting with Nas' Illmatic.

Nas released his debut, Illmatic in 1993 and with production from Qtip, DJ Premier, L.E.S, Pete Rock and Large Professor just to name a few, the album had A class beats plus Nas' rhymes put him in up there where his name would be mentioned among the best to ever do it.

You gonna love the samples too, trust me on this. There are no no-name producers on this album and the album is totally flawless. Ok, you must have heard the cd right?

Ok, so enough of the requisite album review. Lets check out the samples of Nas' Illmatic album.

NY State of Mind

Premo did this one.



NY State of Mind contains a sample of Mind Rain which was performed by Joe Chambers on his 1977 album Double Exposure.



NY State of Mind also has this soulful piece by Donald Byrd called Flight Time. Oooh, I could listen to this all day.



And finally, check Rakim saying "NY State of Mind" in the chorus of the song. Thats from Eric B and Rakim's Mahogany.

Tomorrow, the samples from Life's a Bitch.

Live Your Life - Numa Numa

Well I just checked out TI & Rihanna's #1 song Live Your Life video and decided to drop it on here.



Yeah, Live Your Life has a sample in there. You know the opening part where Rihanna does the yodelish type singing? Well it comes from a song by a European trio called Ozone.

The sample however was modified due to copyright issues. The song is called Dragostea din tei (er...thats pronounced Numa Numa :))

O-Zone - Dragostea Din Tei
Uploaded by babe11

Ready Or Not - Fugees Sampled Enya

And Enya wasn't too pleased about it. She hadn't let them use her song Boadicea, but 'Clef and them used it anyways.

Enya's song Boadicea.



Funny thing though is that I thought The Fugees sampled the theme song from an early '90's movie called Sleepwalkers. Its one of those Steven King novels made into a motion picture.

Anyway The Fugees flipped it real nice and made something banging out of it.



And of course you know Mario Winans and his bitchassness talking bout I Don't Wanna Know.

Rappers Love Taana Gardner's Heartbeat

This morning I'm listening to DMX's second album, Flesh of My Flesh, and It's all Good comes on. I knew I had to do a post on this because that rappers just love Taana Gardner's Heartbeat.

You've probably heard Taana Gardner's Heartbeat before. Its a disco song and is said to be one of the slowest disco beats. It makes a great break beat for rappers to spit over though.

Here's Taana Gardner's Heartbeat:



Sweet eh? DMX lays down his pimp game on It's All Good.



But no matter who you are, Heartbeat is best known for its use in early 90's dancehall artist, Ini Kamoze's Here Comes The Hotstepper. Its probably the biggest song to use Heartbeat. Here Comes the Hotstepper was # on the US Billboard Hot 100 Charts and was used in the movie Pret A Porte (Ready To Wear).



De La Soul also used it in their 1991 hit, Buddy, off their classic album 3 Feet High and Rising. Buddy featured other Native Tongues... A Tribe Called Quest, Jungle Brothers, Queen Latifah and Monie Love.



Another B.U.D.D.Y also used the same beat. Check out Musiq SoulChild's version.



Are we done yet?

Nope.

Blackmoon used Heartbeat for their record Two Turntables and a Mic. Man, I remember that one. Thats real hip hop right there.



KRS One also sampled Heartbeat on his I Got Next album with a song by the same name. Heartbeat featured Redman and Angie Martinez.



Harlem rapper McGruff used it on his song Before We Start and Mack 10 & Snoop Dogg repped their respective hoods over Heartbeat in their song LBC to the ING.

Rappers just love a good breakbeat so you can be sure there's more that I didn't mention.

On another note, Sample*licious got another blogger by the name of DJ Funktual. You can look forward to his posts very soon and check out his profile on Youtube.

Welcome DJ Funk!

Straight to Hell in Paper Planes

I'm loving that Paper Planes song right now. Especially the remix version with Lil Wayne and the Notorious BIG sample. I couldn't find it online though.

MIA's song is mad catchy so listen at your own risk.

M.I.A. "Paper Planes" (Uncensored)
Uploaded by bluntedsoul

Nice how they use a sample of one of my old man's favorite bands, The Clash's Straight to Hell.



If anyone finds the remix version of the song with the Biggie sample, please link ya boy.