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Marlena Shaw, Oft-Sampled ‘California Soul’ Singer, Dead at 81

Marlena Shaw, the oft-sampled soul singer best known for her enduring 1969 hit "California Soul," has died at the age of 81.

Shaw’s onetime label Verve Records added in a statement, “We are saddened by the passing of Marlena Shaw, a wonderful singer whose ‘California Soul’ is as popular today as it ever was and whose album It Is Love: Recorded Live At Vine St. helped relaunch the Verve label in 1987.” While never a chart-topping artist, Shaw remained active throughout the Seventies and Eighties, recording albums for Blue Note, Polydor, Columbia and Verve. Shaw’s catalog would later become a treasure trove for turntablists and hip-hop producers, with her music sampled on songs by the likes of Gang Starr, the Avalanches, Drake, Schoolboy Q, Ultramagnetic MCs, DJ Shadow, The Game, Jay Electronica and Ghostface Killah, with the latter’s “Ghetto” prominently making use of Shaw’s “Woman of the Ghetto.”

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