Swopepusha
Friday, 09 October 2009 10:13
Mr. Fab (RIAA / Bootie LA) pulled one out from the past:
Mr Fab from mashup project RIAA/LA Bootie crew here. Was wondering what was the source material for PooPoo Varmint's "Swopepusha"? Just heard a new song called "Baby" by a group called the Phenomenal Handclap Band and the ending sounds like the loop used on "Swopepusha."
I downloaded "Swopepusha" off Napster musta been 10 years ago and played it a hundred times, at least. So so great. So I recognized it right away in "Baby."
Appreciations on the props, and now to tell some stories about the background of our song:
Okay, sources revealed: Putney Swope, an awesome 1969 movie is it. It appears the soundtrack music is by Charley Cuva, and although a soundtrack album was not released at the time of the movie, an after-the-fact soundtrack was made later (and the LP of that would make a great birthday present for me... ahem). The music's from a commercial in the movie for Go Lucky Airlines; that soundtrack webpage includes a 45-second preview of the music that ECC sampled. Also check this video's music track (skip to 1:02 if you're impatient) and you'll recognize the theme in a different song.
The Swopepusha / Swopepusher track was actually the second track by Poopoo Varmint, a collaboration of The ECC / DJ Pantshead with T!x Eon. Now that you know the source material you can decode the title: Swopepusha = Putney Swope + Squarepusher, although no actual Squarepusher was sampled in the track. Since Poopoo Varmint's first collaboration, After All, got some good play & attention by appearing on etoy's TOYWAR.lullabies compilation, I figured Swopepusha (a much stronger track, in my opinion) would do well. Alas, it didn't end up finding a home, except on The ECC's webpage (and Napster).
Last year I picked open the track's Acid files, hoping to re-render it to something better than the 128kbps MP3 version (no .WAV saved? duh) but version 2 stalled and I didn't quite make it through. After Mr. Fab's email I took another stab and ended up with the updated version 3 below. Somewhat better fidelity, although it's the same arrangement as the original.
As with any art you revisit from 9 years in the past, there's a lot I'd do differently now... but for now, at least here's a version you can hear a little better.
Swopepusha v3 (2009)
Swopepusha v1 (2000)
P.S.: And by the way, that's Mae West moaning in the background.
