I have to admit that, like most others, I was initially attracted to this tune by its sampling of Lou Reed’s Walk On The Wild Side. But there was much more to the New York rappers than that – though Reed got all the money and the teenage rappers never saw a penny.
Which is doubly unfair as that memorable bassline was created by British session man Herbie Flowers, whom Reed paid a paltry £17 for his work.
Still, that was 50% more than he got for Rock On by David Essex – another classic bassline – and double his pay for playing bass on Bowie’s Space Oddity.
There were more samples on Can I Kick It: not least Ian Dury’s What A Waste, Spinning Wheel by Dr. Lonnie Smith and a spot of Prokofiev, but none of them – least of all the Russian – put in a claim for royalties.
It’s not just the samples that make this so great; it’s the loping backbeat and the playful call-and-response vocal interplay. And… Well, OK, it’s mainly the samples. But that’s no shade on Q-Tip and his boys.
The quartet came to prominence in the mid-80s as members of an early hip-hop crew called Native Tongues that included Queen Latifah, The Jungle Brothers, Monie Love and De La Soul – who appear in the video for Can I Kick It? shot under the Williamsburg Bridge.
Q-Tip made his first appearance on record with The Jungle Brothers, who gave the quartet their name A Tribe Called Quest, and followed that by rapping on Buddy by De La Soul.