Muestreo de imagen de sonido en Fear of a Black Planet

Abstract

In this article, we debate the sampling techniques in the record Fear Of A Black Planet, released in 1990, by North American rap group Public Enemy. As a hypothesis, we embrace the idea that the use of samples establish another discourse, parallel and articulated to the discourses and contents expressed in the compositions’ lyrics. The use of certain samples, in certain ways, develops a curious “territory of signification”, in which we attempt to describe and problematize. For such effort, in a first moment, we dedicate ourselves to the very definition of sampling, as much as the recognition of its importance in the interior of rap and hip hop’s culture. Following that, we recur to punctual theoretical contributions, which are given by (amongst others) Walter Benjamin (his notion of “shock culture”, for instance), Vilém Flusser and Spanish literary critic Eloy Fernández Porta (in his case, the idea of “name dropping”). We conclude with the occurrence of a very particular archeology of textualities and affirmative discourses.

Keywords

• public enemy
• fear of a black planet
• sampling
• image-sound