Random: Hmm, This New Kanye West Song Sure Sounds Familiar

Songs that sound like other songs is my guilty pleasure so this is pretty top notch.

Gave the album a listen, nice album.

Also yeah... when I listened to it I thought of Zelda.

Kayne write a decent news article Nintendo Life?

I'll never forget Green Diamonds Like Zelda.

Not giving that fool any money.

If theres anyone that deserves a Nintendo cease and desist, it's that pompous Kanye.

Kanye West and the Kardashians prove the old theory that image will be everything and talent is not as important in the future. Which is now.

maybe my ears aren't working but they sound very different to me.

@quinnyboy58 Seriously? It's practically identical to the Gerudo Valley theme. I would have picked it up even I hadn't read about it first!

@Zidentia

I don't like Kanye's music, but you are foolish to say he has no talent.

Kim on the other hand....

Listen!

I really didn’t like JIK and that’s after finally listening to MBDTF like last week and loving it. The production’s all over the place and there’s genuine sample clipping. Also the teased Nicki Minaj song isn’t on there so he manages to have 0 room for female vocals but fits in a Kenny G solo? Bizarre.

the music for some reason reminds me of candyman but nice picking up gerudo valley too.

@YagaMaki Yea, probably because the clip in the article has the actual Gerudo Valley theme added to it.

It's a chord progression. You can't copyright a chord progression. It has the same chord progression as Gerudo Valley and that's it, there's nothing else there that sounds like it could have come from Zelda other than that. Gerudo Valley wasn't the first song to use it, Kanye West won't be the last.

I accidentally wrote a riff with the same chord progression, then worked out how to play the lead on top on purpose. It happens all the time, but it wouldn't be Kanye ripping anyway, it wluld be his producer haha

My Princess ain't no hobbit, please don't let her be a hobbit.

Are the Nintendo Ninja's sharpening their knives ?

@YagaMaki are you listening to the kanye west song or the mash up clip that has gerudo valley in it? the actual kanye west song to me didn't remind me of gerudo valley and i love gerudo valley's theme.

I can hear it.

And 😂😂😂 to some of these comments.

You do get sampling of course but, um.....

Anyway, that's terrible imo

Are some of you not listening through to the Hallelujahs?

Yes, the chord progression is the same. The issue is not the chord progression so much as when you get to the Hallelujah bridge, which is literally the Gerudo Valley theme sung in Hallelujah chorus.

I watch too much south park. I am thinking fishsticks, hobbits, and dear god this music really does sound like sh#t.

@Zidentia you are uninformed on both Kanye and Kim. Whether or not you like or get him, Kanye has been making compelling entertainment(among other things) for a long time, often rewriting the rules for what hip hop or fashion or whatever can be. Kim is an absolute boss, and her intelligence and talent for influencing and being a human connector and philanthropist should not be underestimated. She is currently becoming a lawyer to use her influence to help free the wrongfully imprisoned, and has already had some surprising results

@quinnyboy58 Whoops, that's what I get for skim reading the article whilst on the bog!

It is very possible this was intentional. Kanye references video games very often, and I think this track has a mention of excitebike

Very cool spot! Kanye never released an album called Turbografx (I think) and all the songs were reportedly going to be named after obscure Wii games. He also started off making video game music!

meh, I always hear Slowdive's "Crazy for You" in the Fire Temple theme. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85JXX5DMlvo

@nessisonett there’s female vocalists throughout the album. If you don’t like the stylized production here, I’m actually kind of surprised you liked MBDTF. The albums in between might be a rocky road for u

Someone was listening to Kanye West?

@marandahir what are you telling about? That's not at all what's going. You must have only listened to the bit where they play gerudo valley over the song. Listen to them separately and it's barely noticeable

@Crockin Idk, MBDTF was maximalist to the max but the production on JIK felt like it was trying to recapture the feeling but the execution was lacking. I’ve never been a big Kanye fan but love Kendrick, A Tribe Called Quest, MF Doom and OutKast so he might just not be my thing.

Hero of Rhyme

@Crockin
I attempted to read this without imbuing any tongue in cheek characterization bit alas I was unsuccessful. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion and I am well aware of his music and her legal "career". I disagree vehemently but a productive debate seems unlikely based on your initial supposition. Best wishes

Kanye really knows how to make black gospel music slap so hard

Jesus is King isn't as good as his best albums like MBDTF or even Ye and Kids see Ghosts, but I dig it from what Ive listened to so far

@DinnerAndWine
He had one crossover hit which was sampled and the rest, in my opinion, is dribble. I will admit I do not like most rap as I prefer old school where there was more originality. I have heard most of his music, fashion "design", his alleged idea for sustainable housing and his blatant copying of interior design from the 1970s and none of it emotes talent. Only delusions of grandeur. I will also include my reply to someone else to further explain my opinion.

Crockin
I attempted to read this without imbuing any tongue in cheek characterization bit alas I was unsuccessful. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion and I am well aware of his music and her legal "career". I disagree vehemently but a productive debate seems unlikely based on your initial supposition. Best wishes

Wasn't Kanye supposed to release an album called Turbo Grafx 16

@Crockin
Sorry, I have more to say on this. Kanye, much like Diddy, lacks originality and there are many who came before them that created true original music. When you fully research Hip Hop which comes from Funk as well as rap you see they all funneled from different places culminating in what is popular now. If you enjoy the current sate of rap then this is a great time but I prefer music that is original, has meaningful lyrics and not lame attempts at glorifying misogyny and materialism resulting in derivative plagiarism.

@Zidentia What is unoriginal about it? That he uses samples like literally every hip hop artist does and did in the very beginning? Has materialism and misogyny not always been present in hip hop and old school funk music? Modern hip hop is actually in a pretty incredible state, and to write it off as being unoriginal would be a misunderstanding imo. I do not think this argument holds up.

I know he is hard to swallow as a person, but really his outspoken persona is the result of decades of suppression of black artistic voices in the media, even if he does say outrageous things.

On Kim, she is doing some great work if you look into it. Very misunderstood as a public figure. I’ve never heard a compelling argument for why she is so bad other she is on tv and is rich. I just don’t buy the Edgy narrative That she is just some ditzy celeb

Ave Christus Rex!

People calling Kanye unoriginal though? Huh? There's no hip-hop artist with a more consistent record of quality output, and that's with him releasing garbage like Yeezus.

I listened to Geurdo Valley first - have never and still have never lsitened to anything by Kanye that I'm aware of - and that Zelda music sounds like 90% of the music written by Ennio Morricone for the Clint Eastwood spaghetti westerns so if anything I'm going to guess Kanye is copying 1 of Ennio Morricone's musical scores.

Couldn't you have made it a bit more clear that the song in that tweet
was edited to have the Gerudo Valley theme added to it? I assumed that was just the unedited song until I read the comments, so I thought he really had just copied the music entirely from OOT.

@Jayofmaya As a fellow musician/songwriter, i have also written stuff that i later realized sounded like another song. It just happens. Fortunately, I am an amateur and unknown, so it doesn't really matter.

As for Kanye, meh. As Solomon said: there is nothing new under the sun.

Meh, Kanye is overrated anyway. And as for Kim Kardashian... the less said, the better.

I'm laughing at the song itself more than any likeness in chord progression to the Gerudo.

Kanye is trash, always has been.

Am I the only one on this earth who hates kanye and rap in general?

@PBandSmelly who hurt u

That's a REACH. Its also not a good song

@PBandSmelly grow up.

@fadedcolors @Crockin
Im sorry that you were so offended by an opinion

@PBandSmelly not offended by any means lol. Does rap make u mad

@Crockin
Kanye is not the brightest person. Just one example is who he decided to marry. Another is that I just dont like the genre of rap. It all seems the same. I could put 10 different raps together with identical beats and music. From what I have experienced.

@PBandSmelly this is the opinion of someone who has listened to very little Kanye, hip hop, and knows next to nothing about Kim kardashian as well. Please step aside and come back after more research

Soo many trolls on here today. Geez. Anyway, I stopped listening to rap long ago so I am old school. I gave this a listen and it's ok. I'd rather he sings about Jesus than the same old lyrics rap music does today over and over.

Also, if he sampled a song from Zelda, that is cool to me. Maybe Kanye is Link and we didn't find out about it till today. ;P

He didn't sample Gerudo Valley here... it's a sample of "Hallelujah, Salvation & Glory", a popular gospel song that was also released in 1998— the same year as OOT. Perhaps the chord progression was just popular during that time.

now lets fuse them together just for the hell of it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d9NuyPxt2s0&feature=youtu.be

Don't make sensationalist headlines - as noted later in the article, these are simply the same chords. Chick Corea uses that progression a lot. I've seen so many articles posting a video with Gerudo's Valley music overlaid, not clarifying that it isn't a sample... I do not like Kanye West, but I also hate this kind of journalism.

Is that just a shadow or did someone decide to blackface Link? It’s not like he’s a human but neither are pumpkins. Seems suspect at best.

@dugan Great! What do you play? I play guitar and drums mostly. Although, I can also play piano, but do so far less often.

Oh my god the comment section

@Crockin
The statement that all rap uses samples yet Kanye is original unfortunately contradicts itself. If an artist feels they need to sample on a consistent basis then they lack originality and most likely true talent. I have listened to a lot of rap, mumble, trap etc and the ones that do not sample are so horrible it defies belief but again this is my opinion. I am also not saying every artist is bad as there some I like but the genre as a whole does not appeal to me for the reasons I have listed. If you are satisfied with Kanye and artists that sample then I say great. I just find it lazy and downright theft(as proven by several recent judgments) to do so. I am also not talking about notes or similarities. I am talking about entire sections that someone rap words over. To be fair several genres have become repetitive including pop, country rap, and country pop. I would place the blame for this trend on producers who look for an easy win and the consumers who do not demand anymore from the artists.

@Zidentia well yea, the samples themselves are certainly not original. It’s how they are arranged and the context created. This is an art form, a deconstruction of musical arrangement, and Kanye has been known to push that envelope, which is one of the reasons his production is so compelling. I promise you that even if a beat doesn’t sound like the source material, it originated from a recording of a drum kit, unless noted otherwise that live instrumentation was used. If sampled beats do not line up morally with what you believe to be honest music, that’s fine, but I don’t how you’ve been able to listen to so much of the genres you mentioned without getting past that initial hurdle.

It’s certainly fine to prefer live arrangements, I’m not policing anyone’s musical taste, but to attempt to delegitimize an art form that has resonated with people on a deep level for like 50 years at least, and has proven itself time and time again with amazing artists like biggie, Kanye, tupac, Kendrick Lamar, OutKast, wutang, Nas, and on and on is just kind of ignorant to a whole culture imo.

This Kanye West Dude I never heard of before is considered "music" ? God what has become of this world.

@PBandSmelly I don’t hate rap but I’m not the biggest fan. Can’t stand Kanye as a person though.

@nessisonett I presume that Nicki's verse wasn't fitting with the Christian themes of the album? Since Jesus is King is apparently a reworked version of his unreleased Yandhi (Which the infamous "I Love It" was set to be on if you want an indication of how radically the tone of the album was changed), her involvement may have been a holdover from that.

@Crockin
I think you are misinterpreting my feelings for sampled music as disdain for record tracks. I have absolutely no issue with "original" prerecorded tracks. An example of what I do not care for would be a song like P Diddys " I'll be missing you" Clearly this is using the Police song "Every breath you take" and while this may be an authorized use of sampling it still lacks originality.

I may have not been clear about the Hip hop/Rap genre appeal. In its current state I do not like it. There are certainly artists I like but the majority are older(old school) artists such as LL Cool J, Kurtis Blow and the like. As far as recycling riffs, sampling etc Rap is not unique in this but the difference is the use of it a cornerstone of the industry and leaves me cold musically.

@Orpheus79V It’s still a shame that a whole album of new material probably won’t see the light of day. I wish I liked this album because I actually loved ye, which had a pretty mixed reaction. I don’t think rapping about Jesus inherently makes it bad, it’s just more that 99.9% of Jesus Rap happens to be terrible. Case and point, that Chance the Rapper album, The Big Day from this year. Now that was worse Jesus Rap than this. I think I gave JIK a 2.5 on RYM, it’s not like completely terrible just uninteresting, badly produced and has one of the most abrupt endings of anything I’ve listened to, and that’s a whole lot of albums.

@Zidentia If you want an example of samples done well, listen to Plunderphonics like The Avalanches or DJ Shadow. If you want an example of samples done right in rap, listen to Madvillainy, one of the best rap albums of the 2000s.

@nessisonett Yeah, that's fair. I liked Ye too, myself. I'm not too sure where exactly I'd put JIK on the rating scale just yet, there's some tracks I really like and others I don't so much. Maybe between a 5 and 6? It does admittedly feel a little rushed despite it's long gestation.

@tseliot @ryancraddock yeah NL has posted a black face link. Classy.

Impressive how a Zelda song released on a console made in 1996 sounds 100% better than modern music...

@aznable Because slightly darkening a fictional character's skin tone is the same as smearing black makeup all over your face and putting bright makeup around your mouth? You millennials and your made-up offenses...

@WaxxyOne actually, you dont need to look like some vaudeville a$$hat to do black face.

Way to use millennial like an insult. I don’t know what age group you belong to, but I’m sure it sucks. Have fun being born in whatever time period you were born in. I’m sure it significantly impacts you and your character. Maybe it’s got something to do with astrology? Do you believe that stuff? You might. You seem to be the kind of person who might believe in astrology. I don’t know what it is, just something about your personality I’ve gathered from your comment. Intellect? Daring? Insight? Obfuscation? Truthiness?

I’m sure I’ll figure it out.

@Jayofmaya (sorry, I only post once a day) I play keys and bass guitar. What genre/style do you play?

@ryancraddock I’ll accept that. Easy mistake to make tho. As the youth might say, “my bad.”

I also listened to the mash up first and thought it was a straight rip off, but now I see.

If y'all think that using the same chord progression is plagiarism, then we need to have a long talk about Pachelbel's Canon in C, and like... Every pop song ever.

@dugan Nice! What kind of techniques? Pick, slap, double thumb? On electric guitar I play snd write progressive death metal and rock usually (Like a mix of Veil of Maya, Oh, Sleeper and Chelsea Grin's 3rd album). On acoustic, I play and write folk and tap (If you have heard of Ben Howard and Jon Gomm, a blend of those) and on piano I mostly play more new age, mixed with a bit of classical (like Yiruma and Beethovens Moonlight Sonata 3rd Movement but less fast.) One of my acoustic and piano songs is bossa nova/waltz style and another is a spanish classical type. I guess a lot of things! Haha
What about you?

Sounds like a mashup waiting to be made. I'll be waiting over at OCRemix!

I loved Kanye's college trilogy (seriously, listen to it if you haven't!)
But this sampling sounds a bit low quality compared to his older stuff.

And that's not "it sounds like" It IS Gerudo valley, I fully believe one of the best known VGM tracks made it to Kanye somehow! (And I'm a pro-sample person, so I'm O.K. with that.)

@Jayofmaya I am not too good on bass, mostly just complementing the piano. (although I love listening to good bass players) Sometimes a walking bass line or simple blues progression. I would like to make EDM or D&B, but since I have no programming skills, it sounds like cheesy 1980's techno. I also play rock/pop/folk--songs with stories.

Your styles sound cool and very diverse! I checked out Howard and Gomm, those guys have skill! It is very cool that you have the talent to play such different styles. Not a lot of musicians can or do cross genres like you. As playing and performing music has been a blessing to me, i hope that it continues to make your life better.

Keep playing, friend!

@DownRightSam

No, I ONLY listened to the Kanye song on Youtube, uploaded by Kanye. I knew exactly what they were referring to upon hearing it.

The Hallelujah chorus bit is very much similar to Gerudo Valley.

sorry, i dont get any zelda vibes from his song.

@dugan Thanks! I wish I had more tome to do it, but family and work keep you busy haha Let me know if you want to swap links, I have soundcloud with some acoustic demos and such. Also, just about to record some of the metal. Though, I haven't got the drums fully down, yet so might be a couple more months.

@Jayofmaya My website that has my music is on my profile page here at Nintendo Life. It is a totally free site. Like you, family and work keep me busy. Be warned: the music is amateur, homemade and sometimes silly.

I would very much like to hear your music, you can send me a link through my website. I definitely need more metal in my life and I like chilling to acoustic guitar. PS: I checked your profile: I majored in philosophy in college. Take care, friend!

@dugan No worries dude, I sent you an email!
I'm actually recording my metal stuff in January so I'll be sure to send you a link to that, when it's done.

Great Let me know if you want to discuss life some day haha I just ended up with a diploma in music. Nothing fancy, I'm afraid! You too

Im sorry i just hate everything about this guy, i hope nintendo sues him

@Peterjr1 Heck yeah man, vote with your wallet.

"Kanye West and the Kardashians prove the old theory that image will be everything and talent is not as important in the future. Which is now"

I totally agree. I hope they get a lawsuit.