Christine jamming with U2 (sort of)
 

(Since Eva Cassidy's cover was brought up again, then why not this?)

I've always loved DJ Shadow's debut album Endtroducing (like so many others) but it was only today that I found out about him having sampled Christine's electric piano bit from Brown Eyes for one of his early singles, Lost & Found (1994). And by gum if it isn't a clever use of this hypnotic figure! It takes the drum break from U2's Sunday Bloody Sunday as well, and layers all kinds of beautiful samples on top, even a bit of Lindsey's guitar, and becomes quite a different jazzy thing eventually. Say what you want about trip/hip hoppers being non-musicians, but to me this is clearly a case of making new music out of music.

If you want a listen, go here. Click on the enqueue icon of the track and then press play. Christine's figure starts about 1:50 in. Don't be scared by the scratching before it! ;)

that's really cool.... i've always loved that CM riff

Umm ... that was horrible.

Why isn't this sort of thing illegal? (I don't mean because it's so awful, musically, but because it's plagiarism.)

No more than 8 bars of the music? I understand it is something like that.

On the other hand, they may be paying royalties.

Yeah, I think Shadow's always listed the samples he's used on his album covers. Don't think the 8 bars (or 3 seconds) rule applies - it's enough to sue if the sample is recognizable.

Come tell that to me again once you've listened to Shadow's Building Steam With A Grain Of Salt!