With the surprise passing of David Bowie aka The OG Rappin’ Duke, I thought I’d assemble some notable rap tracks that drank from his expansive musical well. Disappointingly, it seems that only ‘Fame’ and ‘Let’s Dance’ got any sample love outside of the infamous riff from ‘Under Pressure’ with Queen, which means that this is really just the best of a mixed bunch – late career MC Lyte, that time that Bowie did a song with Puffy for the Training Day soundtrack, that other time that the 45 King remixed ‘Fame’ in 1990, Lace Da Booms attempting to channel Puffy, a Charlie Baltimore song subbed in for Robbie Van Winkle, a wonderfully ignorant Suga Free song and the acoustic demo of ‘Ziggy Stardust’ as a bonus.
Download: A Tribute To David Bowie Raps
Track listing:
01 ‘Fame’ – Godfather Don
02 ‘Gangster Boogie’ – Toddy Tee feat. Mix Master Spade
03 ‘Alive On Arrival’ – Ice Cube
04 ‘Been Around The World’ – Puff Daddy and The Family
05 ‘Break North’ – Ultramagnetic MCs
06 ‘It Wasn’t Me, It Was The Fame’ – EPMD
07 ‘Fame ’90’ [45 King Remix] – David Bowie feat Queen Latifah
08 ‘Take Notice’ – J. Dilla feat. Guilty Simpson
09 ‘And One’ [Sha-Self’s What’s Up With A Deal Mix] – Lace Da Booms
10 ‘Put It On You’ – MC Lyte
11 ‘American Dream’ – P. Diddy, Mark Curry, Kain, Black Rob, Big Azz Ko and David Bowie
12 ‘Ice (Ice Baby)’ – Charlie Baltimore feat. Mase
13 ‘Allergic To Bullshit’ – Suga Free
14 ‘Ziggy Stardust’ [Demo] – David Bowie
Special mention goes to this one from James Brown – it sounds like this one was ‘influenced’ by Bowie… https://youtu.be/6Vn–qcqxXI
Wasn’t there a “Fame” remake on Dr Dre’s “Aftermath” album?
@Dino: Yeah but it sucked, as did the ODB song and the House of Pain remix with the same loop.
Embarrassed that I know the Vanilla Ice reference *relinguishes CRC status
Peace Donal d hope you fine ….
RIP David Bowie… tu as laissé beaucoup de choses Positives One
submitting this Bowie demo for the lulz; https://soundcloud.com/mupt/vice-rap?in=mupt/sets/the-mupt-tape
Sage Francis “Strange Fame:” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5pwgtIjqww
My fav use of a Bowie sample:
https://youtu.be/hIthNcXtvog
Nice comp btw, thanks Robbie.
RIP to Bowie and Mark B. Two UK musical geniuses.
Again, nice one Robbie, i’ve spent the day listening to the great man’s music, I didn’t expect to see a tribute on Unkut of all places but props for doing it. To me the guy was an absolute musical giant, it’s like when James Brown died. A true artist right to the very end.
Solid list Rob–a lot of tracks I’ve never heard before. Big RIP shout to Bowie. Too bad he died of cancer, as there’s already a cure for the disease [in the vast majority of cases]. It is cannabis oil–the essential oil from the plant. There are loads of testimonials and scientific studies on it [including on the US govt’s own cancer website]. Just look it up folks!
Need the Max B & French Montana remake of Been Around The World on here too, m8.
@Ziggy: Better than the original?
Nice to hear all these different flips of the same samples.
I must have listened to the ice cube one a thousand times but never picked the sample. … Nice one.
Nas’s “America” from ‘Untitled’ I believe originally utilized a Bowie sample but it was replayed/interpolated for the album version.
Peace Robbie, did you check out Who Sampled? a little more there than “Fame” and “Let’s Dance” there….
http://www.whosampled.com/David-Bowie/
Oh ill I just realized that the “Soul Love” drums were used by the late, great Dilla and on “Barbituates” by the late, great Sean Price (which used the “Take Notice” beat)
Not the biggest Dilla fan but the Take Notice track deserves to be in this list more than that horrible Puffy joint
house of pain – shamrocks &… (famous mix)
Rest in peace to David Bowie and Maurice White of Earth Wind and Fire the hip hop community owes these brothers a lot