I was watching a documentary about a little soul label that was active in the late 60s / early 70s in Florida, the sort of label that would be called 'boutique' nowadays, that got destroyed because of principles versus money supplied by the 'connected" mogul Henry Stone ( who bankrolled the birth of Miami Bass and , allegedly, some multi kilo deals )
Deep City Soul Documentary
and the first tune on the soundtrack is the
UR DEEP SOUL TUNE
I must have heard this before?
Them Two - Am I Good Man
starts off with a guitar lick that Keith Hudson would be proud of
and then that bass figure kicks in
smothered in perfect chords
Helene Smith "ooohs" and "aaaaahs" and then the two Larrys emote in an impassioned manner while questioning the direction of their moral compass
fantastic
so good
the sort of tune that makes you think: "
WU TANG MUST HAVE SAMPLED THIS?"
so I headed off to
whosampled and it's been sampled 75 times since numero group re-released it in 2006
and I tried to listen to them all ( although I may have given up somewhere along the way around about page 4)
so, yes "WU TANG" did sample it in 2010 if you count a Ghostface Killah featuring Killah Priest and GZA tune from the forgotten precursor to
Supreme Clientele ( insert long story about Def Jam not fully supporting the
Apollo Kids album 100% )
Ghostface Killah featuring Killah Priest and GZA - Purified Thoughts
most of the other tunes that sample it copy this formula so I'll skip past z list ghetto legends and move on to other tunes of note
some big names from the distant past tried to use the sample - 50 cent sits on a bed surrounded by exotic dancers counting out dollar bills while he drones on about money, Rakim ( ! ) gives us a lesson about Fred Hampton, The Game makes improper remarks about the flavour of your baby momma, Cypress Hill -oh why bother, these tunes were a waste of my time, these guys should have invested their money in property, or at least a key, while they were still relevant
I did like this 2014 beat from AraabMuzik, it's like you can hear him bashing fuck out of the pads on his MPC in real time, psychedelic in its intensity
AraabMuzik - Maximus
I liked the next video because it exhibits a certain dark humour, although is a crack habit even funny? I laughed more than once, shame on me:
My son buggin' out, he treat me like a steppops
He still holdin' that grudge, 'cause I sold his Xbox
Joell Ortiz feat. Mr. Probz - Never Sleep
Scrolling through the list of "who sampled who" I spotted this:
How could I resist the words "Serbian rapper" in parenthesis?
I really had to watch this one:
Surreal - Dobrodošli U Beograd
at least the producer took the time to hire a singer to reproduce the melody in "Serbian?", they put a bit more effort into this than 75% of the other tunes
I'm guessing at the lyrical content but "rags to riches", "money", "1% biker club", "gangsta", "party"? I'm always interested in seeing ghetto / hood videos from around the world.
speaking of which:
this one is bizarre!
Barbárfivérek | Utcadiploma feat. Saiid, Tirpa
some kids getting ripped off while skipping off school? and then suddenly one of the kids does a Shaggy RAGGA dancehall impression and then the chorus kicks in... shit I'm mixing it up with this one where suddenly the chorus goes WU TANG KILLA BEES LIVE IN THE PLACE TO BE!
Kapsel & Ślimak - Dobrze powiedziane feat. DJ eMBe (official video)
WU TANG KILLA BEES
LIVE IN THE PLACE TO BE!
wiki wiki
KEEP KEEP KEEP
KEEP IT REAL!
WU TANG!
so, the lesson learnt is I prefer the original tune, Them Two - I'm A Good man, as perfect as a 60s soul tune could ever be, sometimes a tune can not be improved upon:
Them Two - Am I Good Man
my tune of the week
edit: the original 45 is out of my price range so I bought the numero group reissue album, this is the best tune on it, but if I ran a label and ever put out a tune as good as this then I could drop dead today and die happy, my work would be done
