hypersongs

Archangel

Track two on Untrue, built from pitched vocal fragments of Ray J's "One Wish" and a string sample from a video game.
Burial, from Untrue (2007)

Released
2007
Length
3:58
Album
Untrue

Play on hypersongs

"Archangel" came out on Untrue on November 5, 2007 and as a single the same year, and reached number 21 on the Flanders Ultratip chart. He made it in 2007 in Sound Forge, alone, with no studio. It takes pitch-shifted vocal fragments of Ray J's "One Wish" (2005, produced by Darkchild) and turns them into new melodic phrases; the main string sample reportedly comes from the Metal Gear Solid 2 soundtrack, with bullet-shell sounds from the game, and the pitched-up oh nos near the end are said to come from a Christina Aguilera a cappella. These attributions come from Songfacts and Far Out, and a report of MusicBrainz songwriter credits could not be checked, so no writers are listed here. It sits on dark, warm sub-bass with skipping garage beats under crackle. No statement from him on the song, and no video, was found.

Rosalia's "CANDY" on Motomami (2022) samples "Archangel", as the Clash article of March 18, 2022 reports; the full list of samplers was not checked.

Sources

  1. Untrue (album), Wikipedia
  2. Archangel, Songfacts
  3. One Wish (Ray J song), Wikipedia
  4. Revisiting Burial's Untrue, Far Out