It's a James Brown/Tupac mashup, sure. But there's something else there.

March 20, 2013 4:21 AM

So I'm listening the other day to the soundtrack for Django Unchained, spurred on by the recent thread about Ennio Morricone. I come up on "Unchained", which is the big James Brown-derived number used in the trailer. There's a piece of music used there that's nothing from "The Payback", and after going online to listen to "Untouchable", the other track credited as being sampled, it's not from that, either. It's the western-ish rising section audible from about 0:04 through about 0:25. I could swear I know it from somewhere, but I'm coming up empty, and I'm not having much luck through the ol' Goog. Anyone know what it's from?
posted by MarchHare to Media & Arts (5 answers total)

i figured i'd give it a go: from the credits on ascap (work id: 884754400), everyone seems to fit outside of the portion you are curious about. james brown and tupac shakur are main performers, dean kasseem and bruce washington are producers, yafeu fula and anthony henderson are associated with tupac, and john starks and fred wesley are associated with james brown. perhaps some further searching in to ascap or related archives may help?
posted by figure eight at 4:43 AM on March 20, 2013

Response by poster: I guess it's possible that what I've assumed is a sample is an original piece assembled specifically for that track, but damn if it doesn't sound like something I know from years ago.
posted by MarchHare at 4:51 AM on March 20, 2013

If you're talking about 0:04 - 0:25 here then that's 0:35 in The Payback replayed with some additional Western guitar over it far as I can tell.

If there's a section with the strings before it, or you're looking for the source of the guitar, I don't know either of those.
posted by solarion at 5:24 AM on March 20, 2013

I think it's just a "western-ized" variation of the melodic bit leading up to the bassline drop in the original Payback. (edit - what he said ^ )
posted by p3t3 at 5:25 AM on March 20, 2013

Response by poster: It is indeed the source of those guitars I'm looking for. I'm starting to lean toward them having been arranged in a deliberately familiar-sounding riff.
posted by MarchHare at 5:36 AM on March 20, 2013