This Monday, Action Bronson dropped his madcap, adventurous debut album Mr. Wonderful. Although it was a little less sample-driven than his prior mixtapes, its live instrumentation was still often based around skeletons of existing songs taken from far-flung genres, as is Bam Bam's habit.
We've already covered "Easy Rider," "Actin Crazy," "Terry" and "Baby Blue" in previous editions of Samples Of The Week, so this time we're putting some of the deeper cuts under the source-material lens. Let us know your favorite tracks in the comments section.
Item #1
"The Rising" is the one song on the album produced by Bronson's Well-Done cohort Statik Selektah, and as he's prone to do, he scratches in a vintage sample on the joint. The Brockington Ensemble's gospel record "When I Rise" provides aspects of the instrumental and hook on the track.
Mr. Wonderful
Earlier on in Mr. Wonderful, Bronsolino rhymes "Sittin' in first class with a hard dick" with "Listenin' to German guitar riffs," and we don't get an adequate explanation for this until second half track "Only In America." Sounding like hair metal, the song is based around a riff from a 1982 song by German band Artischock.
Mr. Wonderful
"City Boy Blues" is arguably the wildest song on Mr. Wonderful. Bronson doesn't rap on it, opting instead for some zooted-out singing, and its instrumental is based around yet another vintage German rock song, this one more in the krautrock style.