Production Breakdown: “Hey!” Has Kanye Been Listening to “Supereme Clientele”?

Richard's taking a well-deserved day off, which means you're stuck with me for this week's "Production Breakdown". (I know, I know. Even I don't think I'm as good as Richard when it comes to production. He's a genius, and I'm just, well, not a complete moron.) Anyway, while it's nowhere near his 14-part sample history behind Kanye's "The Joy", I did discover one tidbit of Yeezy-related sample goodness this week. And I mean tidbit.

We've all learned a lot about Kanye over the past few weeks - for example, he likes bird/woman sex and fucking hates him some Matt Lauer - but we've also learned that he's obsessed with that "Hey!" vocal sample. The most prominent example of "Hey!" is "Runaway".



..but it actually popped up first on Rick Ross's "Live Fast, Die Young" (in which he also uses the "You all look like beautiful stars tonight..." sample.



And those are just the two example I know. I wouldn't be at all surprised if the production heads out there in RefinedHype Nation had even more examples. Clearly Kanye loves the "Hey!". But where the hell did he get that "Hey!" from? I had no idea, at least until earlier this week when I was drinking and listening to Ghostface albums (as I often do), and "Healthy Living" came on. Anything sound familair?

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But this wouldn't be "Production Breakdown" is we stopped there. I don't know if Kanye was also listening to "Supreme Clientele" and the "Hey!" on "Mighty Healthy" caught his ear or he got it from somewhere else, but either way the origin is the intro to James Brown's "Funky President".



Although if I was a betting man, I would put my money on Kanye bumping a lot of Ghostface lately. Does this "Louder!" vocal sample ring a bell (listen closely to the 2:05 mark):



And there you have it - way more than you ever wanted to know about a sample that contains a single word.