- (Alex) When is a song fully original, and when is it not?
Music has a layered history, so you might not know
that a song you love is sampling from a song in the past.
Some are obvious. Some aren't.
But we've got you covered by breaking it down every episode.
This is Sample School.
This episode, we'll be taking a look at "Work" by Rihanna.
(Jamaican accent) From the island of Barbados
(normally) comes the youngest and fastest solo artist
to earn a whooping 14 number one singles on the Billboard Hot 100,
Robyn Rihanna Fenty, which is the actual pronunciation of her name.
Her appeal was seen early on when rap mogul Jay Z
invited the teenage Rihanna to audition for Def Jam,
where she blew them away with her future hit single "Pon de Replay"
and eventually signed with them.
From that point on, Rihanna became an unstoppable force
in the pop and RnB genres, nabbing eight Grammy awards,
12 Billboard Music awards, and selling 215 million digital tracks,
making her the top-selling digital artist of all time.
Rihanna's lead single off her album Anti, "Work,"
did some work on The Billboard Hot 100,
climbing to number one in its second week
and remained in that position for nine weeks.
The song features previously covered Sample School artist Drake,
marking the duo's third collaboration.
The song's instrumental,
which blends the Jamaican musical genre Dancehall with hip hop,
helped boost Dancehall's mainstream popularity.
BUT is it an original beat, or is it sampled from something else?
All right, you know the drill.
Before digging into it, let's listen to a snippet of "Work."
- ♪ Work, work, work, work, work, work ♪
♪ You see me, I be work, work, work, work, work, work ♪
- (Alex) And just like that, it's stuck right back in your head.
But let's speed it up,
tweak several of the background elements,
and remove Rihanna.
- ♪ Work, work, work, work, work, work ♪
♪ You see me, I be work, work, work, work, work, work ♪
(Rihanna's voice fades)
♪ (synth pop beat) ♪
- (Alex) Okay, okay, maybe it isn't that easy to decipher just yet,
so let's play it against another song made in the not so distant past of 1998,
and measure them against each other.
♪ (Richie Stephens, "Sail Away") ♪
- (Alex) Looks like the song pulled this sample
straight from its island roots with Richie Stephens 1998 song "Sail Away."
Jamaican born Richie Stephens started his career
off with a bang in the '90s
as a part of the British musical group Soul II Soul,
nabbing him two Grammy awards.
Later, he established his own label focusing on Reggae,
putting out popular Dancehall singles like "Legacy"
and "Come Give Me Your Love," which both appeared
on the UK Singles Chart.
"Sail Away" was a part of the Sail Away album,
released in 1998 by Stephens, and became a big hit in Jamaica.
While the instrumental hasn't been sampled much outside of Rihanna,
the album it was on also featured several tracks that used
the instrumental by artists such as Beenie Man and Mr. Vegas...
♪ (Beenie Man Feat. Mr. Vegas, "Bad Man Nuh Flee") ♪
- (Alex) ...and Sean Paul.
♪ (Sean Paul, "Fit and Legit") ♪
- (Alex) Even more interesting though is that "Sail Away"
also samples another song,
pulling from Alexander O'Neal's 1985 track "If You Were Here Tonight."
- ♪ I only want to love you more ♪
- (Alex) So much so that it resulted in the song's producer
getting a composer and lyricist credit on "Work,"
so that's three degrees of sampling.
What did Stephens think of Rihanna's sampling of his song?
He gave clearance to Rihanna's team in under a week
to use it for a single, along with being credited as a co-writer,
so we'd say he's pretty open to the idea.
Always one to evolve his craft, Stephens created
a new sub-genre in 2014 called Ska Tech
to keep up with the popularity of EDM in Jamaica
that blended Jamaican Ska and EDM.
Today, he continues to work as a solo artist,
while also working with an Italian Ska group.
All right, recap time!
"Work" sampled "Sail Away,"
it helped Rihanna be the top-selling digital artist of all time,
and Jamaican Ska EDM may very well become
my new favorite sub-genre of music.
(school bell rings)
And that brings us to the end of another episode.
Consider yourself Sample Schooled.
As always, keep those awesome suggestions coming
in the comments below.
The team and I love reading them.
From all of us here at FBE, thanks again for watching this episode,
and see you next time.
♪ (pop music) ♪