Pushing Critical Thought: Sampling Politics Today

Abstract

As a practice performed by human beings, music is connected to politics in manifold ways. One way of bringing the political into music is the technique of sampling. With this method, music producers take sound snippets from external sources and incorporate them into new musical compositions. In this first issue of the Norient Sound Series, we examine how political contexts of our time are transformed into musical production. Among many further accounts, we follow the sampling of car horns in Indonesia, read about an Italian refugee project that uses smartphones as sampling resources, and reflect on ethical questions such as: Can one sample sounds of war? With case studies from all around the world, this Norient Special approaches sampling as a tool for critical thought and a way of alternative storytelling.