Double Dee and Steinski
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Doug DiFranco ("Double Dee") and Steve Stein ("Steinski") were hip-hop producers who achieved notoriety in the early 1980s for a series of sample-based collages known as the Lessons, which are still well-regarded today as early underground hip-hop classics. Although they never had a hit record, they proved highly influential for subsequent artists such as Coldcut, DJ Shadow, Cut Chemist, the Avalanches, and Girl Talk. Their music has never been widely available on CD due to their use of copyrighted material, but there have been occasional illegal re-issues, and several internet sites have mp3s of their music available for download.
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History
In 1983, Tommy Boy Records held a promotional contest, in which entrants were asked to remix the single "Play That Beat, Mr. D.J." by G.L.O.B.E. and Whiz Kid (members of Afrika Bambaataa's Soulsonic Force). By day, Double Dee (DiFranco) worked in a professional music studio, while Stein (Steinski) was a copy supervisor for Doyle Dane Bernbach. Although the two were older (27 and 32, respectively) than most of their peers in the hip-hop community, they were both enthusiasts of the genre; Steinski, in particular, had been attending downtown rap clubs for years and had an extensive knowledge of hip-hop's history (although the first hip-hop records didn't appear until 1979 ("King Tim III (Personality Jock)", "Rapper's Delight", "Christmas Rappin'"), DJing was a phenomenon that had been around since 1973).
Their contest entry, "Lesson 1 – The Payoff Mix" was packed with sampled appropriations from other records—not only from early hip-hop records and from Funk and Disco records that were popular with hip-hop DJs, but with short snippets of older songs by Little Richard and the Supremes, along with vocal samples from sources as diverse as instructional tap-dancing records and Humphrey Bogart films. As critic Robert Christgau noted, "[the record] was pieced together in DiFranco's studio in 12 or 14 hours over two days. What was most striking about it wasn't the plethora of quotes, 24 in all [...] It was the specificity and catholicity of their references." The jury, which included Afrika Bambaataa, Shep Pettibone, and "Jellybean" Benitez awarded Lesson 1 the first prize.
Double Dee and Steinski followed up this success with Lesson 2 — The James Brown Mix in 1984, which began with a sample from The War of the Worlds before quickly running through a montage of memorable breaks from classic James Brown records, with sampled appearances by Dirty Harry and Bugs Bunny.
In 1985 came Lesson 3 — The History of Hip-Hop Mix which attempted a survey of the great breakdancing favorites, along with snippets from Johnny Carson and Hernando's Hideaway.
"We'll Be Right Back" was released in 1986. As the title indicated , the track was dominated by samples from TV and radio adverts from the 1950s and 1960s.
1987 saw the release of "The Motorcade Sped On", which utilised snippets of newscasts about the assassination of John F. Kennedy and associated events over a drum track sampled from the Rolling Stones' Honky Tonk Women. In the UK the NME included the track on a giveway 7" EP record.
In 1988 "Let's Play it Cool" was released on Fourth & Broadway.
Tributes and recognition
Since the 80s, many hip hop artists have added their own contributions to the series of Lessons—a partial list is included below:
- The De La Soul song "The Magic Number" from their 1989 album 3 Feet High and Rising begins with a tribute to Double Dee and Steinski's "Lesson 3"—it contains many of the same samples, arranged in a similar, although shortened, sequence.
- DJ Shadow – "Lesson 4" (1991)
- Cut Chemist – "Lesson 4: The Radio" (1993) – At the time, Cut Chemist was apparently unaware of the existence of Shadow's similarly-titled "Lesson 4" from two years earlier; the two would later collaborate on several "Live Lessons".
- Cut Chemist – "Lesson 6: The Lecture" (1997) – This track appears on the Jurassic 5 EP. Many editions of the EP contain slightly different versions of the song, due to copyright issues. Most notably, samples of the "Jawa Theme" from Star Wars are missing from most of the re-issues.
- DJ Format – "The English Lesson" (1999)
- DJ Bombjack – "Lesson 7" (1999)
Recent years
Although Double Dee currently pursues a career in sound design for television, Steinski has remained active in recent years, doing occasional remix work and longer old-school mixes, as well as DJ'ing regularly in Europe and the UK using a laptop and midi gear. The pair reunited in 1998 to remix Afrika Bambaataa's Jazzy Sensation, in 2002 for a live performance at the Roseland Ballroom in New York opening for DJ Shadow, May 2006 opening for ColdCut at Irving Plaza, and August 2007 opening for Negativland at the Highline Ballroom. Steinski is interviewed in the 2001 documentary Scratch.
In 2002, all three of the original Lessons were re-released on vinyl, as well as for the first time on CD, on a collection entitled Ultimate Lessons.[1] This compilation also featured DJ Shadow's Lesson 4, as well as several live collaborations featuring Shadow, Cut Chemist, Steinski himself, and Shortkut. Although it was widely available at the time shortly after its release it can be difficult to track down today; this is most likely a bootleg or unlicenced recording due to the dozens of uncleared samples — it is common practice for such releases to be printed in small numbers to avoid the unwanted legal attention of the copyright holders.
Two more compilations soon followed, and although these sequels contained few, if any, contributions from Double Dee and Steinski themselves, they follow the same tradition of sample-heavy dance-collages reminiscent of old school hip hop. Some of the more well-known artists to appear on Ultimate Lessons 2[2] and Ultimate Lessons 3[3] include Coldcut, DJ Nu-Mark, Kid Koala, DJ Red Alert, and Fatboy Slim. As of 2006, they are relatively easier to find than the original Ultimate Lessons, although it is likely that they will go out of print very soon. In 2007 Steinski released a track on ten12 records to revisit the Skull Snaps infamous drum break, one of the most sampled beats in history, on the It's A New Redux project.
Double Dee and Steinski opened for DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist on their NYC tour dates (1/26/2008 and 1/27/2008) at Irving Plaza.
Steinski's radio show 'A Rough Mix' went back on the air between June 7th and October 4th, 2007 on WFMU 91.1FM in the New York-New Jersey metro area.[4] The weekly broadcasts are archived on-line at the station's website.[5]
In 2008, "Lesson 1 - The Payoff Mix" was officially issued on CD by Illegal Art Records on a compilation of Steinski's mixes entitled What Does It All Mean? 1983-2008 Retrospective.
Miscellanea
- Steinski has claimed to draw inspiration from the Flying Saucer records of the 1950s.
- It is interesting to note that although the Lessons were highly influenced by early hip hop DJs, and have in turn greatly influenced the practice of Turntablism, neither of the duo were proficient as DJs; instead of being mixed live, the Lessons were created piece by piece, by editing together short samples using a turntable an 8-track deck and a stereo deck. They do not contain any scratching.
Currently they are using Ableton Live as well as ProTools software.
In 1984, Double Dee teamed up with David Witz, a CBS Records producer who recorded as Arthur Ether, to create "Taste So Good", which they released under the name File 13. "Taste So Good" was built from snippets of recorded sex-phone calls over an original instrumental bed, and while too racy for radio in 1984, the 12" single found immediate success in nightclubs and reached #38 on Billboard's Dance/Disco Top 80 on 10/6/84. File 13's "Taste So Good" is included on Volume 3 of the "Street Jams; Electric Funk" series on Rhino Records, as well as other compilations.
