Good Feeling

The sample chain behind Good Feeling is one of the more remarkable in recent pop history. Etta James recorded "Something's Got a Hold on Me" in 1962 — a gospel-tinged R&B song that Rolling Stone would later rank among the greatest recordings of the twentieth century. In 2011, Swedish DJ Avicii lifted her vocal for his breakthrough track "Levels." Within months, Dr. Luke and Flo Rida lifted it again, layering it over computerized beats and acoustic-driven guitars to create Good Feeling. Three generations of music, fifty years apart, arriving at number three on the Billboard Hot 100.

The result is a song that works almost entirely on the strength of what it borrowed. Good Feeling is unapologetic about this — Flo Rida told MTV at the time, "It's legendary, we got Etta James featured on there, so it's crazy." The nine writing credits on the track tell the story of how pop music actually functions in the streaming era: songs as layered artifacts, each generation of listeners receiving a version of something that existed before they were born. The New York Rangers adopted it as their unofficial victory anthem for two consecutive NHL seasons, playing it after every home win at Madison Square Garden.

Etta James died on January 20, 2012, while the song was still charting. Flo Rida dedicated it to her memory. The dedication was apt — without James's original performance, recorded nearly fifty years earlier, none of this exists. The sample chain that runs from 1962 through 2011 is its own kind of argument about what music is for: not just the song you're listening to, but everything underneath it, reaching back further than you expect.