Frank Kogan

I think my basic point is that "Walk This Way" or something equivalent was going to occur regardless of Michael because hip-hop was taking up the rock-funk-punk mixtures that were happening everywhere they could in NY, and "Beat It" was hardly the template. LL (or Rick Rubin) isn't going to say to himself, "Oh, because of 'Beat It' I am inspired to sample 'Johnny B. Goode.'" It's not because of "Beat It" but because of Flash and Bambaataa and Funkadelic etc. etc. that sampling "Johnny B. Goode" is an obvious move.

(I always thought "Rock Box" was clumsy and kind of boring, and thought "Sucker MCs" rocked a lot harder, actually, despite the latter's not having a guitar.)