As a practice performed by human beings, music is connected to politics in manifold ways. One way of bringing the political into music is the technique of sampling. With this method, music producers take sound snippets from external sources and incorporate them into new musical compositions. In this first issue of the Norient Sound Series, we examine how political contexts of our time are transformed into musical production. Among many further accounts, we follow the sampling of car horns in Indonesia, read about an Italian refugee project that uses smartphones as sampling resources, and reflect on ethical questions such as: Can one sample sounds of war? With case studies from all around the world, this Norient Special approaches sampling as a tool for critical thought and a way of alternative storytelling.

A detailed analysis of the sampling strategy behind the track "kenats" by Lara Sarkissian. Sarkissian (*1992) is an electronic music producer based in Oakland, California. She further acts as a DJ (DJ FOOZOOL), filmmaker, party organizer, and label owner (Club Chai). Sarkissian is of Armenian descent, and grew up as part of an Armenian diaspora community.

A detailed analysis of the sampling strategy behind the track “Methy Imbiß” by M.E.S.H. M.E.S.H. is the artist James Whipple (*1985), who was born, grew up, and was educated in various places in the U.S. before moving to Berlin in 2009. Whipple published his first album "Piteous Gate" in 2015 and his second album "Hesaitix" in 2017. The track “Methy Imbiß” (PAN Records 2015) forms part of his first fulllength album and contains a hidden sample of war sounds from the military conflict in Eastern Ukraine in 2014.

What does it mean to process field recordings from the Ukrainian war in an electronic music track? How can the sampling of an Armenian keyboard melody be read as a critique of traditional gender roles? And what does it say about voyeurism in our culture when a techno producer uses viral YouTube videos as the basic material of his compositions? Across five detailed case studies, Hannes Liechti discusses the culture and politics of musical sampling from a new perspective. Giving particular attention to the reasons behind sampling processes, Liechti’s in-depth analysis of sampling strategies by artists such as COOL FOR YOU and Lara Sarkissian shows that sampling political material, and sampling with political intentions reveals a complex net of contexts, meanings, and often deeply personal choices and creative decisions. Offering tangible tools and concepts for further exploration of sample-based music, the book illustrates the potential of popular music to tell stories about the world, and it describes the habits, thoughts, and realities of the laptop producer, one of the core actors in 21st century music-making.

The open access publication of this book has been published with the support of the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF).