Anatomy of A Sample: The New Vaudeville Band and The Beatnuts

I remember digging with my man Mfasis and pulling this record out of a pile of crap. He was like, “Yo that’s a Beatnuts joint”. I was like, really? I mean the pic on the back looked like some Strawberry Alarm Clock looking cats, so for a quarter I pulled the trigger. I loved the fact that my man didn’t tell me which joint was used, so I had to search through the thing to find it. I have a friend named Skills who does that stuff with the MPC. I am bad at making beats, but he (and his 16 yr old son) are both on the MPC with their eyes closed. Skills will make a beat, then just be like “figure it out”. Then he will just bounce. He ain’t giving nothing away.

That being said, neither was MFasis. When I did figure it out proper, The Beatnuts chopped up The New Vaudeville Band’s “A Nightingale Sang In Berkley Square” for their 1999 hit featuring Greg Nice called “Turn It Out”. In typical Beatnuts fashion they flipped this corny ass sample to a hot beat, which in turn led to a hot song. The ‘nuts always had a knack for making hot beats, and they turned this slice of kitsch into some Hip Hop gold. The best part is when I just pulled out this record to photograph it, the 45 for Ripple’s “I Don’t know What It Is, But It Sure Is Funky” fell out. An added bonus for me.

The New Vaudeville Band “A Nightingale Sang In Berkley Square”