SAMPLED▌ FEATURE
12 stories
Stories filed under Feature on Sampled — sound, style, and scenes, all in one place.
This week in music: Usher and Chris Brown hit the road, the BET Awards crowned a new generation, and the Village People lost a voice
Four stories from the last week: a tour launch, an awards night, a courtroom verdict, and an obituary.
What the federal filings actually say about Pooh Shiesty, Gucci Mane, and a contract signed at gunpoint
Prosecutors say a printed 1017 release, an AK-style pistol, and a text asking for "6 certi" are now central exhibits in the case against the Memphis rapper.
The Prophet-5 sound: five underground tracks that built the legend (and where it lives now)
From boogie B-sides to ambient dubplates, the Sequential Prophet-5 quietly shaped half a century of underground music. Here are five records that prove it — and the GForce plugin trying to keep the sound alive in 2026.
ASCAP vs BMI vs SESAC: Which PRO Should a Songwriter Actually Join in 2026
A no-spin breakdown of America's three performing rights organizations — what they cost, who they pay best, and the one question that decides it for most writers.
This Week in Music: Catalog Control, New Eras, and the Artists Rebuilding the Room
Phoebe Bridgers frames a return, Charli xcx turns pop into a full creative system, Daisy Chain Fields treats the festival as social infrastructure, and yasiin bey reopens a complicated catalog. The week's real story was access — who gets to control the doorway.
Two paths through the catalog economy: Boy George's AI gambit vs. HarbourView's Chaka Khan buy
In a single week, two opposing legacy-catalog strategies surfaced. One sells a stake to a fund. The other tries to use AI to take ownership back.
Madonna skipped the streamers and put 'Confessions II' on YouTube — the album-as-platform play
After a Tribeca premiere on June 5, Madonna's new cinematic experience landed today as a free, exclusive on her YouTube channel — not Netflix, not Apple, not Disney. It's the clearest signal yet that artist channels are becoming the release window.
Every sample and interpolation on Kendrick Lamar's GNX
From Debbie Deb to Jon Hopkins to a 1979 Disney score — the full sample map of Kendrick's surprise sixth album, cross-checked against the credits.
Nettspend, Gucci, and the moment underground rap became a casting call
An 18-year-old viral rapper from Virginia walked Demna's first Gucci show in lavender snakeskin. The album landed three weeks later. The pipeline from SoundCloud to Milan is now a single hallway.
Drake dropped three albums in one night and the internet still can't agree what happened
ICEMAN, HABIBTI, and MAID OF HONOUR landed together on May 15. Two weeks later, the discourse is louder than the music — which might be exactly the point.
che's Fully Loaded is rage rap's SoundCloud-first power move
The Atlanta teenager surprise-dropped a five-track EP on SoundCloud — anchored by 'Million Dollar Mansion' — and the deep-voiced, self-produced rollout is his clearest 2026 thesis statement yet.
Hi-C and the Rotting Logic of Survival Horror Rap
By mapping the skeletal remains of early 2010s gaming onto a bit-crushed 'vamp' persona, the Reptilian Club Boyz visionary turns digital decay into high art.