Thursday, March 20, 2008

Gooch at XXL's Scratch Blog Weighs In On The "Posting Sample Sources Online" debate

I've posted about one of Gooch's blogs before and I'm always interested to see what he has to say on the topic of production. So of course he needed to respond the Madlib/TIHH sample issue. After giving readers a bit of context for the debate, he writes:

Myself, I’m kind of towing the line on how I feel about the situation, because I definitely see both sides of the coin.

Alright, both sides now!

a) The negative effects of sample sets for producers:

Guys like Madlib have made their career on hunting for and then flipping samples that most people would otherwise just skip right past. And while I do think listing the sources that he’s sampled is a means of honoring his work, it may in fact be detrimental to the guy’s career. Madlib’s whole aura is built off of this idea that he’s mining sample sources that others wouldn’t. By listing what he’s sampling, you’re sort of taking the mystique out of what it is he does, showing the cards in his hands, if you will. Also, it wouldn’t be unreasonable for some publishing company who owned the rights to the material that’s being sampled to find your list of samples online and actually come knocking for some royalties. It’s not like these albums make NO money. Everyone wants their cut. Plus that whole idea of showing the cards devalues what it is that producer does.

b) the argument for providing sample sources used by producers:

Of course sample-based producers have been sort of bitching and moaning about this sort of thing since the 90s, when sample compilations started turning up on vinyl everywhere, listing who sampled what and everything. I think at this point these guys just have to deal with the fact that the internet is this well of information, and if people can expose what someone else is doing- whether it’s in appreciation of their art or to tear them down- it’s going to happen regardless. So fighting it, or asking people to take down these lists is futile, at least in my opinion. When you’ve got sites like The-Breaks.com providing an encyclopedic-style database of samples, and they’ve been doing this since like forever, it seems kind of pointless. I think, if anything, these sites help more than hurt, just from a buzz factor alone. The reality is, someone is talking about you somewhere. They’re that interested in you and your work that they’d take time out of their life to not do some other shit (eating, sleeping, watching pr0n) but analyze and dissect what is you do as a creative entity. If that isn’t an ego stroke, I don’t know what is.

Read the whole post here and as always, let Ivan, myself and the rest of the HHIR team let us know what you think. And after this, hopefully we'll be done with posting about it (unless Jay Smooth makes a video about it...)

It's certainly an important issue but we don't want to hammer it into your skulls. We'll keep comments on the posts open so you can add your two cents.