Budo's Neck-Snapping Sample for Macklemore's 'Heroes,' with cuts by DJ Premier

A celebration of sampling

Macklemore’s pop breakthrough album The Heist in 2012 with producer Ryan Lewis was deliberately sample-free. "We specifically strayed away from that," Macklemore told EW back then. "We wanted to make an album that was pretty much sample-free, where we didn't have to clear anything."

But times have changed. The in-your-face, all-but-subtle sampling of the horns, bass, and marching drums of "Tiger Trot" sound like a celebration of sampling. Fully embracing a sample-heavy production ethos in line with boom-bap's golden era.

Budo: "The sample is so dope that the beat for 'Heroes' sort of made itself. I pulled the drums and bass from their original stems, but the horn line is what really gives the song its power. We brought in a couple of horn players—Jared Tankel from the Budos Band and Greg Kramer from the True Loves—to add some extra intensity to the horn stabs, and brought in a long-time collaborator named Josh Rawlings to play some piano. The whole process was seamless and quite natural."