Word: riffs
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...that I've exhausted the ideas/food metaphor, let's talk music. MC Hammer admitted that the "Dowmp, Da-Da-Dowmp, Da-Dowmp, Da-Dowmp" riff in "U Can't Touch This" was lifted from Rick James's "Super-freak," and gave credit where credit was due. But I could swear I've heard the first four notes of the riff in Falco's "Der Kommisar" and Paula Abdul's "Cold-Hearted Snake," too. Who's plagiarizing whom? How many possible notes and rhythms are there? Isn't copycatting inevitable...
...radio these days, do they have a familiar ring? Listen more closely to what's tickling your subconscious. In many cases you did hear that sound before, maybe long ago. It's the James Brown beat that's now in a rapper's groove, or the recycled '60s riff in a current dance- floor hit. It's the steam heat of the early '80s hit Under Pressure recycled in the vanilla-rap hit Ice Ice Baby, and the streak of the funk classic Super Freak revived for M.C. Hammer's U Can't Touch This...
...love at first sight. But her brother, Bernardo (Dean Shapiro), is the leader of the Sharks, a Puerto Rican street gang, and Tony's a member of the Jets, a rival "American" gang. The young lovers want to stop an upcoming rumble, but when Bernardo kills Jet leader Riff (John Ducey), Tony avenges his friend's death by offing Bernardo...
...narrow passageway behind the seats, to expand the set and surround the audience with action. Light Designer Tim Magner uses different lighting techniques to convey changes in time and space--particularly during Jake's occasional daydream or flashback. And Hill's staging enchances the production by emphasizing the riff between the two clans. One side of the stage is reserved for Jake's family, another for Beth's, and their paths rarely cross...
Outside, the rain is beating a relentless riff that is familiar to anyone who has lived through a monsoon in Southeast Asia. Inside the Army-issue tent in a clearing at the jungle's edge, Nash A. Miller, a onetime helicopter door gunner and crew chief, is changing into a dry pair of camouflage fatigues. As his two watchdogs prowl silently, Miller, nicknamed "Nam" (his initials), recounts his tale with a small, innocent smile. It begins at a firebase in the badlands west of Kontum, near the Vietnam-Cambodia border, in the summer...