Thursday, April 5, 2012

Sampling: Creative or Criminal?

Sampling is definitely a tricky subject. Personally, I believe that remixing and sampling is fine, as long as only a small portion of the original song is used, and that it is repurposed in a way that makes a completely new piece of art. When I think of what it would be like if all sampling were to be outlawed, I realize just how much great music would be lost. Some of our favorite songs (probably most of them) sample a different artist’s original idea and we don’t even know it. I think it’s important to realize that these artists aren’t necessarily taking samples and claiming the whole song as their own. Rather, they are putting pieces together as a collage, and that is the creative and original aspect of it. Keller talks about this quite a bit, stating, “The first point is about collage as a technique: the selection, arrangement, and juxtaposition of the found bits of prior culture is the art” (Keller). A collage using pieces of newspaper or pictures from a magazine can be considered art, so is music sampling really any different?

For example, most of us are familiar with EMINEM’s song, “My Name Is” which first gained fame in the late 90s for its provocative lyrics. What most people don’t know is that he sampled a Labi Siffre song from the 1970s entitled “I Got The Blues” in order to make it. To say that the two songs have a completely different vibe would be an understatement. Still, the underlying beat of both songs is the same. So, did EMINEM steal from Labi Siffre? I really don’t think so. I never would have recognized that they were the same and that in itself is pretty impressive. It takes a lot of work to be able to pull apart a piece of music to its bare bones and make it into something completely different and unrecognizable. As Miller states, “To specialize in either music or literature you need months, years of reading or listening to music” (Miller). I don’t care what people say about originality, it takes skill to be able to do what EMINEM (and countless others) have done with sampling.

Now, there is a fine line between sampling and stealing, and I do think that some artists take it too far. In my own opinion, if a song obviously contains another artists sample without giving credit to the original artist, then it is unacceptable. Hints or whispers of previous beats and lyrics are okay, but exact copies are not. Many people argue that all of this is irrelevant because stealing is stealing no matter how the stolen goods happen to be used but the law currently doesn’t follow this mindset. Here is how Keller explains it: “The law limits the rights of intellectual property owners, and grants the public rights to share in the intellectual property's value, in ways that would be unthinkable for tangible property like cars or bushels of wheat” (Keller). This is true, but music (in this sense) isn’t cars or bushels of wheat. It’s music. It’s intellectual property, and there are reasons why intellectual property laws have to be different than tangible property laws. It’s often impossible to prove who thought of what first and how recognizable the stolen copy is to the original. Like I said at the beginning, sampling is tricky.

Overall, I believe that sampling is perfectly fine. In fact, I love remixed music and would be devastated if it were ever banned. But there is definitely a line between sampling and stealing. I’m just glad I don’t have to be the person to figure out exactly where that line is.

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