De La Soul’s Legacy Is Trapped in Digital Limbo

I just started working with the Umass student group that put on concerts on campus (UPC). I did stage crew and security. The 1991 spring concert was the big one, an all day affair, with a purchased stage students put together.

Del La Soul didn't show.

Bob Dylan showed (Mr. Dylan as he liked to be called), had to go on early. He was not to happy about it. Other bands in the 1990s that showed up to the spring concert, phish, beastie boys, mighty mighty bostones, wailers (without Marley obviously), voilent femmes....

Odd that these events were pulled together without cell-phones and the internet. There is hardly any online info on those concerts. Life before youtube..

The lineup 1991 lineup (thanks google): Chucklehead, Gene Loves Jezebel, The Feelies, De La Soul, Bob Dylan.

All the records they sampled had their labels blacked out with marker. I freaked them out a bit by recognizing Hall and Oates and Steely Dan samples.

I don't know anything about the clearance problems, but it's true that this was one of the first records that used samples so extensively as the core basis of the tracks.

A bit later I worked on Queen Latifah's "All hail the Queen", which also used samples liberally. I never heard of any problems with that record but perhaps Tommy Boy were more careful with the clearance legalities by then.