Stem (song)

"Stem"
Single by DJ Shadow
from the album Endtroducing.....
Released	1996 (1996)
Format	7" vinyl, CD
Recorded	1996 The Glue Factory (San Francisco, California)
Genre	Experimental hip hop, plunderphonics
Length	11:14
Label	Mo' Wax
Producer	DJ Shadow
DJ Shadow singles chronology
"Midnight in a Perfect World" (1996) "Stem" (1996) "The Number Song" / "Painkiller" (1998)

"Stem" is a song by DJ Shadow from his 1996 debut album Endtroducing...... The song reached #9 on the Ireland singles chart, DJ Shadow's only ever top 10 hit.

The album version of the song combines "Stem" with "Long Stem" and "Transmission 2".

Samples used

Like all other tracks on the album, "Stem"/"Long Stem"/"Transmission 2" makes heavy use of sampling. Below are among the samples used for the track:

• The first sample used in the track is sampled from the beginning of the 1969 song "Love Suite" by Nirvana.
• The "...uicide...uicide..." vocal sample is taken from "Moshitup" by American hip-hop artist Just-Ice featuring fellow American hip-hop artist KRS-One.
• The high-pitched string samples are sampled from "Variazione III" by Italian psychedelic rock band Osanna.
• The recurring guitar and violin parts are sampled from "Linde Manor" by American singer-songwriter Dennis Linde.
• The organ sample that starts "Long Stem" is taken from "Tears" by Italian musician Giorgio Moroder; the same sample is used on another track on Endtroducing...., "Organ Donor".
• The "I could just lay right down..." vocal sample is taken from "Blues So Bad" by American funk/soul group The Mystic Number National Bank.
• The "parking tickets" dialogue from that appears midway in the song is sampled from "Freedom" by American comedian Murray Roman.
• The synths that appear in the "Long Stem" section of the song are sampled from "Oleo Strut" by American electronic group Mother Mallard's Portable Masterpiece Company.
• The "Transmission 3" section starts with a piano sample of "The Madness Subsides" by Finnish musician Pekka Pohjola; the same sample is used on another track on Endtroducing...., "Midnight in a Perfect World".
• The final sample, "This is not a dream..." is sampled dialogue from the 1987 film Prince of Darkness.

Track listing

1. "Stem" – 3:24
2. "Long Stem" – 4:26
3. "Red Bus Needs to Leave!" – 2:41
4. "Soup" – 0:43

Use in popular culture

It has been featured in several films and on television, including:

• The 1997 film Twin Town
• The 1997 film One Eight Seven
• The 1999 film Wisconsin Death Trip, originally broadcast in the UK as part of the BBC's Arena series
• In Chris Morris' TV series Jam which aired on Channel 4 in 2000.
• An advert for a BBC television programme that aired in November 2006 called Lock Them Up or Let Them Out
• Used in the background of the ITV programme The X Factor in Series 3.
• A BBC World War II documentary about Saint Nazaire that aired on 18 March 2007 called Jeremy Clarkson: Greatest Raid of All Time. The show was repeated on the BBC on 29 June 2008.
• UK TV adverts for O2 and Guinness.
• A 2007 TV series that is airing on Bravo in the UK in May 2007 called Brits Behind Bars: America's Toughest Jail.
• A BBC Panorama programme in June 2007
• Football's Hardest Away Days on Bravo
• An episode of the BBC1 TV series Britain's Lost World that aired on June 26, 2008.
• The trailer for 2003 film Gothika
• First semi-final of season 1 of British TV series Britain's Got Talent, during the flashback introduction for MD Productions
• A 2009 French anti-drugs campaign.