Beat, mixing and mastering by Tapehead
Vocals and scratches from ‘It’s On Acapella’ by Naughty By Nature

Visuals: https://youtu.be/23KpyhbQYfQ

I deliberately waited until the start of 2022 to make this beat. I found the sample a while ago and was crazily gassed off it, there was just so much potential for layers, basslines, vocal chops etc, and the energy was just too positive, exactly the kind of motivational feel which I thought would be dope to start the year off. I really wanted to take my time to flip it properly, I chopped it up into a crazy amount of pieces to get the flow right (which I’ll definitely be showing in a behind the beat video soon). The song is actually a love song talking about not being able to stop your feeling of love for someone, but I wanted to change that and only take the vocals about not stopping, that way it can be about anything really. For me it’s absolutely about making music and staying motivated with that, but it can be about whatever anyone’s passionate about really, as long as it’s true to you and what you love to do, then just about focusing, learning and staying dedicated. 

Because I’d been planning the beat in my head for so long it came together well and pretty much as I’d planned, but I never really thought about what acapella could work over it. It was definitely difficult at first cause I couldn’t really think of any songs which fit the upbeat vibe of this beat, I was initially trying Onyx acapellas cause their loud style kind of fit with the horns in the sample, but their voices and subject matter are always so grimey and hardcore sounding, which was a bit too much for this beat. It took a lot of trial and error and none of the acapellas I was trying sounded that good on the beat, for sure the flow was nice on a lot of them but it just didn’t match up the way I wanted. I just kept going and when I tried this Naughty By Nature acapella everything fell into place. It makes sense now, cause they have a very upbeat style similar to Onyx but more ‘friendly’ and less over the top, which is exactly what I thought would work well over the beat. Their flow has mad bounce to it too which fit the sample well especially the horn melody, and to top it off the scratching of ‘on and on’ for the hook fit the ‘can’t stop’ vocals from the sample perfectly. It’s dope when I think that I made this beat to express the feeling of staying motivated and dedicating yourself to something no matter what, and then had to do exactly that when I was working to find the right acapella for the remix. I guess it shows that it’s universal and constant really, that need to work never goes away, but in my opinion hard work and dedication will always pay off, and as long as you’re happy with what you made then you achieved something worthwhile for sure.

Peace!!

Can't Stop (It's On)

Beatmaker / Emcee
Contact: tapeheadloops@gmail.com

<--MPC2000 Classic                     

Underground Airplay

Trying to give something back to Hip Hop - really appreciate any comments or feedback.

Peace