SAMPLED examines the skeletal production of a contemporary rap, R&B, hip-hop or pop song — Where did the loop, sample, or chopped up vocal providing the backbone originate? SAMPLED gives you the history, the context, and the insight.

This week, we’ve got samples from two songs to cover, so let’s get right into it. The first is the 1967 single “Tramp,” by blues guitarist Lowell Fulsom:

Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1921, Lowell Fulsom was one of the most important blues guitarists in America in the 1940s and 1950s. In 1940, Fulsom moved to California, and started a band with a young Ray Charles, and a tenor sax player by the name of Stanley Turrentine. He would record original music for over fifty years, under contract with nine different labels, and Fulsom had success with chart success with over a dozen singles, most notably his 1950 #1 hit, “Blue Shadows.”

“Tramp” was famously covered by Otis Redding and Carla Thomas the same year the original was released, and though their cover version was more popular, the original has been sampled in songs by Salt-N-Pepa, Prince, De La Soul, Cypress Hill (“How I Could Just Kill A Man“), and dozens more.

What might sound good as a short four bar intro preceding Lowell Fulsom’s janky guitar stab from the intro of “Tramp”? Probably “Juicy Fruit” by Mtume. That sounds good lined up against almost anything. Check it:

Oh hey, it’s a break from one of the most important and recognizable songs that anyone has ever sampled. Mtume is a funk & soul group that was active in the eighties, founded by Miles Davis’ former percussionist James Mtume. After recording three albums independently, Mtume signed a deal with Epic records in 1978. The 1982 album Juicy Fruit brought the group their greatest success when the title track spent eight consecutive weeks on top of Billboard R&B songs chart.

I should probably also mention this. If you don’t know, now you know. (Sorry).

Both of these songs were recently sampled by beatmaker Harry Fraud in Action Bronson’s “Strictly 4 My Jeeps,” the first track we’ve heard from their forthcoming Saab-sponsored collaborative mixtape Saab Stories:

The opening bars of Action Bronson’s “Strictly 4 My Jeeps” borrows the drum sample from “Juicy Fruit” supported by a heavy sub-bass, but knowing that Bronson reps Flushing, Queens and Fraud was born and bred in Brooklyn, it’s a deliberate nod to B.I.G.’s “Juicy.” Even though Bronsollini doesn’t rap over it, and it never reappears, it still screams New York.

Fraud chops the funky opening guitar chord from Lowell Fulsom’s “Tramp,” and pitches it down for the basis of the “Strictly For My Jeeps” arrangement. The sample reappears at the first beat of every bar for almost the entire verse, supplemented by a reverbed-out boom bap, sirens, synths, and 808 hand-claps.

There’s still no word on a release date for Saab Stories, but I’ll keep this track on repeat until it drops.