Or Does It?

http://www.complex.com/music/2012/05/lupe-fiasco-says-issue-with-pete-rock-not-resolved

So never mind about this being over. Apparently, Dwayne Wayne still has beef, and he feels like Pete pulled a sneak move. This interview brings to light something that hasn't been discussed in a while: sampling rights. According to Lu, the original sample for T.R.O.Y. was never cleared, ever. 

Gather 'round kids, and let me tell you about a magical time in Hip Hop. Once, long ago, you could use samples with no regulation. Well, more like nobody was paying attention. Before artists realized (or cared) that producers were using their tracks for samples, nobody had to pay to use them. It wasn't like producers were being shady to the artists intentionally, there was no precedent for this at the time. "Diggin in the crates" of records for cool snippets to expand into tracks was, and still is, a rite of passage for "real" hip hop producers. (Once apon a time, before he started listening to Justice, Swizz Beats was reviled for disrespecting the art of sampling in an interview.) Finding that obscure sample and flipping it is the producer's equivalent to snagging a pair of exclusive kicks. (And I mean real exclusives, like limited-run, Japan-only colorway J's, not some sponge-bob, flea market joints.) For a brief time in the late 80's, snitching on someone's sample (telling people what song it came from) was as bad as snitching to police, partly because it could financially wreck your entire career. The Beastie Boys' Paul's Boutique would never get released today. Even with an unlimited budget, you might not be able to track down all of the rights' holders, and even then, you would get destroyed on any residuals. The most notorious example of this is the song "Bittersweet Symphony" by The Verve. Basically, they'll never make another dime off of the biggest song they ever made. Supposedly, they can't even put it on a greatest hits album.

So anyway, when Pete Rock originally made this song, some parts of it were apparently never properly cleared. In order for Lu to use the original beat, he would have to clear the samples, so the beat had to be remade. (This has been done before, although an example escapes me at the time.) If you listen to the track, you can tell it isn't quite the same (in a bad way). So whatever actually happened, now Lu is so upset he had to call Sway (while he was driving through a tunnel, apparently) to talk about the whole situation. 

This is a bad look for everyone involved. Ima steer clear of this whole nonsense going forward, because what hip hop needs is not more fucking drama. Pete Rock is one of the greatest producers of all time. His influence on Kanye, RZA, and Just Blaze, to name a few, is obvious in their sound. He's also old, at least by rap standards, and this is just not helping people think otherwise. Lupe is one of the best lyricists out today, but also a noted enthusiast of some lame shit (Linkin Park, for example), so when he goes off like this, it doesn't look good at all. I'm not saying that you should make every decision based on what people will think of you, I'm saying you should be talking up your future projects, not getting involved in beef that makes people think your future projects probably suck. Maybe this is just how you "dumb down" marketing.

P.S. - Hear the original that Pete sampled in the clip from The Boondocks below.