Chipmunk Soul Era

Former Interscope-signed rapper Jensen Karp recently stumbled across a couple of CDs in his garage, both given to him in 2001 during his time at the label. Each had the name Kanye West written on them and are believed to be the oldest Kanye West beats to ever be released. Both can be streamed here for those interested in checking them out.

This had AllDayPlay.FM and the Wild & Krazy Kids reminiscing on a pivotal shift in rap music from all beat machine generated sounds otherwise known as “keyboard beats,” to beats composed using loops of old vinyl, or “sample driven beats”. So where does the term “Chipmunk Soul” come in? Well, if you ever heard a used a record player, it has two settings, 78 and 45 rpm (revolutions per minute). If you put a 10 or 12″ record on a 45rpm setting the record plays faster making the voices on said record high-pitched (like a chipmunk version of the record). This style of making beats with sped up samples was perfected by Kanye West and Just Blaze and it produced countless hits for Camron, Jay-Z, and Twista, just to name a few. Listen to this podcast to get a crash course in the Chipmunk Soul Era.

Fun Fact: This Chipmunk Soul style of beat making was allegedly created first by RZA of Wu-Tang.

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Download: Krazy Kids Radio- Episode 80- “Chipmunk Soul”