Biz Markie’s third album, I Need a Haircut, arrives on Cold Chillin’/Warner Bros. The record includes “Alone Again,” which uses an uncleared sample of Gilbert O’Sullivan’s “Alone Again (Naturally),” setting up the landmark dispute that helped define the era’s clearance expectations.
The Low End Theory is released, exemplifying a post-1980s shift toward more selective and deliberate sample use (including jazz sources) amid tightening legal and label scrutiny of sampling practices.
In Grand Upright Music, Ltd. v. Warner Bros. Records Inc. (S.D.N.Y.), Judge Kevin T. Duffy grants a preliminary injunction over Biz Markie’s unauthorized sampling and refers the matter for possible criminal prosecution—an aggressive stance widely seen as a turning point that pushed the industry toward routine sample clearance.
The RIAA certifies The Low End Theory Gold, underscoring that commercially successful early-1990s rap albums increasingly had to navigate a clearance-and-risk environment shaped by decisions like Grand Upright.
In Jarvis v. A&M Records (D.N.J.), the court addresses copyright claims arising from defendants’ admitted digital sampling of plaintiff’s recording/composition. Alongside Grand Upright, cases like Jarvis contributed to the early-1990s legal climate that made uncleared samples a major liability for labels and artists.
Biz Markie releases All Samples Cleared!, an album title that openly references the new reality: commercial hip hop releases were increasingly expected to clear samples to avoid injunctions, damages, and pulled product.
The U.S. Supreme Court rules in Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc. that commercial parody can qualify as fair use and rejects a presumption that commercial use is automatically unfair—an important counterpoint to the era’s strict anti-sampling rhetoric, even though it was not a straightforward “sampling” case.
Sampling, lawsuits, and the Grand Upright era (1989–1994)
