Arcane Desires

Over the past month I've been fascinated by the seemingly infinite remixes of M.I.A.'s "Paper Planes" (MP3) off of Kala. Her lyrics in the verses kick ass, and "M.I.A.: Third-World Democracy. Yeah, I got more records than the KGB" is the icing on the cake. The hook is sampled from The Clash's "Straight to Hell" (MP3) off of Combat Rock, and everyone from The Beastie Boys to Jim Jones have remixed it. Panda Riot even did a full-blown cover. But the Most Fucking Awesome Remix Award goes to Dskotek's nu skool breaks cut-up mix (MP3) . The drum production is fucking amazing, with these bleeps and bloops and swooping analog synths turning into 256th notes. Plus it takes all of the vocals into account perfectly, rather than going with the tired "use two second loops from the original and put a 4 on the floor beat behind it" technique. Highly recommended as one of the best tracks that I've heard in a fucking while.

Here's the weird part: T.I.'s new leaked single "Swagger Like Us," (MP3) -- featuring Jay-Z, Lil Wayne, and Kanye West -- doesn't remix "Paper Planes." It samples M.I.A.'s sample of "Straight to Hell." Ladies and gentlemen, we have entered the age of metaremixing. But is this a new phenomenon?

Unfortunately, no. Outside of the electronic music community, R. Kelly was probably the great-grandfather of meta-remixing. First there was "Ignition" (MP3). Then there was "Ignition (Remix)" (video). Then there was "Ignition (Remix of the Remix feat. Twista)" (MP3/image). You also had Radiohead doing with two different version of "Morning Bell" on Kid A (video) and Amnesiac (video). Where does the madness end, ladies and gentlemen? I ask you, where does it end?

Girl Talk's pay-what-you-want new album Feed the Animals (MP3s released on the "Illegal Art" label) samples 300 different songs. It was released on June 19, 2008 under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial License, probably because he was trying to acknowledge that he was doing something cool but illegal. At this point, all of these sounds, these mashed-together waves, can be snatched up by producers and broken into infinitesimal fragments. At what point do they cease to be the original author's creation?

"'Is a quine' is a quine" is a quine. Is a remix of a remix a remix or a reremix or a metaremix?