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Something ‘Bout S*A*M and Sluggo
Posted by bebereader on Saturday, July 17, 2010
From @claudette4u @DavidArchie You wrote the song , right??
From @DavidArchie @claudette4u Yep With Sam and Sluggo
S*A*M and Sluggo, co-writers (with David and Chris DeStefano) of “Something ‘Bout Love” is a New York City-based songwriting and record-producing team composed of Sam Hollander and Dave “Sluggo” Katz. Collaborating since 2005, they helped transform ‘emo’ music (punk rock with emotional lyrics) from an underground genre to a more polished sound in the 2000’s.
“There is no tension in their songs, even though the songs are almost uniformly about the inconstancy of young love. They hew to a simple, effective blueprint: a twisting, pleading vocal; dense walls of rhythm guitar and bass; hooks with enough space to encourage sympathetic singalongs. It’s mood over skill, blunt feeling over nuance.” ~~ Jon Caramanica, The Music Review
In 2008, S•A•M & SLUGGO were named “The Rolling Stone Hot List Producers of the Year.” The multi-platinum hit “Shake It”, co-written and produced by Sam and Sluggo is perhaps their most popular work to date.
Video credit AmandaClaire09
Sam and Sluggo began their partnership in 2005 when they worked together on the title track for the movie “Snakes On A Plane” by Cobra Starship, which went to #1 on Fuse and MTV. Since then, they have written and/or produced Top 40 pop hits for Boys Like Girls, Gym Class Heroes, Kelly Rowland, The Cab, Carole King, Cartel, The Academy Is…, Coheed and Cambria, Metro Station, We The Kings, Katy Perry, Blake Lewis,Train, Arrested Development, Sugar Ray, Tom Jones, Uncle Kracker, Charlotte Sometimes, The Virgins, Hey Monday, All Time Low, David Cook, O.A.R., and Mike Posner among others. In researching the careers of S*A*M and Sluggo I’ve found that they have quite a repertoire of songs that have gone gold and/or platinum including “Check Yes Juliet” by We The Kings, “Cupid’s Chokehold” by Gym Class Heroes, “The Great Escape” and “Love Drunk” by Boys Like Girls, and Katy Perry’s “If You Can Afford Me”. Further, many of their songs have made it to Rolling Stones Singles of the Year List including “About A Girl” by The Academy Is. The duo have also written and produced for Blake Lewis of American Idol, Season 6 including “How Many Words”/”Here’s My Hello” and “Heartbreak on Vinyl,” which went to #1 on Billboard’s Hot Dance Airplay chart and Billboard’s Dance/Club Play Songs.
Once upon a time on a rooftop in New York City, while ducking the pigeons, a song was born. It is something about love. And the rest will be history.
Click on Song Title to Listen
The Voice David Archuleta 
Pabuckie said
Thanks Bebe! Love reading your articles about the songwriters here. SBL – love that it was written in NYC with the pigeons! haha
I think this video and song is going to take off this summer!
All the talented, wonderful people David is working with. I think they are all seeing his artistry, his talent, not to mention his great work ethic and I bet it’s nice working with someone as fun to be with as David 🙂
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Abrra said
Thank you Bebe for always bringing the writers David works with into focus. It adds depth to meet those who helped write the lyrics, as much as the band who plays behind him.
Abrra
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Pabuckie said
From last night 🙂
I think the video is going to awesome!
This guy also worked on it!
long night of editing and long day @DavidArchie shoot tomorrow. I don’t mind. In fact, I love.
1:51 AM
Calories!!!!! Cannot wait! @DavidArchie shoot http://twitpic.com/261emn
http://www.walidazami.com/
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Pabuckie said
Forgot to add: his bio says “The heart can see further than the eye”! 😉
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Fg said
Thanks for this article. I have high hopes for SBL but I don’t wanna get too excited. Gotta go to work today then we have my son’s 6th bday party tomorrow! Can’t wait to see the video that Mr. Rockstar was up til all hours working on!!
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SandyBeaches said
Thanks Bebe…You don’t realize how little you know about what is going on until you read about all the people involved with David and what is going on…We are right up there smart and educated, haha…we are trying…Have a good Saturday!
SB
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nanawezie said
Very nice! BeBe…Thanks for digging up the poop… whoops I mean scoop.(I have ducking the pigeons on my mind)LOL!
It is nice to know a little about the lucky people who get to work with David! Wish I were one of them.
Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend..Something Bout Love is in the air!!!!
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Tweets that mention Something ‘Bout S*A*M and Sluggo « The Voice -- Topsy.com said
[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by kimak and Shawna Tidwell, jana. jana said: https://thevoicedavidarchuleta.com/2010/07/17/something-bout-sam-and-sluggo/ << Interesting. […]
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emifriend said
Great article Bebewriter! I love learning about these people! Maybe it will help me converse with David when I run into him at Trader Joes! No, really. I love the creative visionary/visual types. I am creative myself, but not in the same way they are creative; I love to hear about how they operate–writing on a rooftop, dodging pigeons included. The gigantic pizza is pretty amazing in it’s own right( never seen one that big before) So here’s cheers for another good story and background info on David’s next successful endeavor!
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emmegirl said
Thanks bebe.
In honor of the releasing of the FIRST single (I am positive there will be more off this album), here are a few fav tweets I saved while he was making this amazing album. (This is just a small sampling of the dozens,and does not even include any of the maniacal tweets from Eman and Co. Oh, how I now wish I would have saved them all.)
TWEETS:
@cjai man i love this kid’s VOICE!!!
@cjai i love being in the presence of REAL SINGING!!! he’s KILLIN!
@LeoBre RT @IglooTracks Studio with David Archuleta! <– ur joking!!!!!! what!!!!
@IglooTracks @LeoBre dead serious homie
Studio with David Archuleta!
@LeoBre @IglooTracks that's hugge man! He's crazy talented. Represent!!
@khaled1985 @cjai i can hear him from the other room…. hes dope no doubt!
@cjai man @davidarchie did such a great job… he’s ready to “fight for this” ya’ll haha hope you guys are!!
@djswivel
Amazing session with @davidarchie @cjai @jremyofm today. BIG record!!
BobbybassOFM
@ArchieOnIdol great sessions. What a talented and down to earth guy. We made a GREAT record.
@natecampany: @davidarchie is laying down the vocal. he is INSANELY good.
@cjai listening back 2 this record 2day…this guy…is a force to be reckoned with…
david archuleta will be around for a long time #markmywords
@cjai I gotta say @davidarchie. Your song with with @JRemyOFM & @BobbyBassOFM
is so huge… *heart swell*
*heart swell* indeed.
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YJfanofdavid said
Bebe, Thank you for another informative and educational article about David’s songwriters!
I have a foonote for your article! Right after David’s tweet about writing SBL with Sam and Sluggo, I tweeted the following:
“Writing on the roof with @SamiamHollander and Sluggo. Ducking the pigeons.” 4/15 <- SBL or another song?
12:43 PM Jul 1st via web
And Sam tweeted back!
@YJfan SBL!
4:54 PM Jul 1st via Twitter for BlackBerry® in reply to YJfan
In fact I had another twitter exchange with him although it's not about SBL:
He tweeted:
@ Beach Yoga class this morning. Me and 47 – significantly more limber- grandmothers. I live the AARP dream!
9:51 AM Jul 6th via Twitter for BlackBerry®
I tweeted back:
@samiamhollander Went 2 yoga class and the relaxation part was set 2 the Script's Man Who Cannot be Moved. It worked surprisingly well lol
And he replied again!
@YJfan that's awesome!
3:10 PM Jul 6th via Twitter for BlackBerry® in reply to YJfan
(Now I shall tweet him Bebe's wonderful article about them!):)
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kaycee said
Emmegirl, loved being reminded of all those great tweets! Makes me even more excited for September! I love how he blows everyone away that he works with.
Bebe, thanks for the great information–very interesting stuff!
Can’t wait to hear about the music video. Hope everything went well–it was so hot! My daughter applied for the leading lady role (probably the only music video she would ever feel comfortable doing!). She received a very nice email from the director letting her know that they had already filled the spot.
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emifriend said
YJFAN
Very cool… Hope you can connect the site with them– I think they’d really like us! And I am sure they are very interesting people, and it would be fun to learn more about them. e*m*i
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bebereader said
Thank you all for the kind comments!
It was a thrill to learn that so many of S*A*M and Sluggos’ songs have been successful. I like learning about where the writers hail from and how they got into the business. Unfortunately, there isn’t much biographical information online for these two writers. But I respect their right to privacy, considering the world wide web.
To keep you up-to-date, the number of writers David has worked with on “Other Side of Down” is approaching the 70 mark!
FG#5 Happy Birthday to your son!
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bebereader said
For all you Twitter followers, I just noticed that Mike Krompass has finally succumbed to the twitter addiction. 😀
Here’s his twitter page: http://twitter.com/mikekmusic
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TOfan said
Bebereader, loving your songwriter series!!!
Here’s some info I came across back when David was writing with them:
http://www.ascap.com/playback/2009/winter/features/rock/hollander.aspx
…and this from Rolling Stone Magazine’s Hot List 2008 — I downloaded a screenshot of the page back then but now it seems to be gone, so can’t link to the original unfortunately, but uploaded here so you guys could read it, hope it’s big enough to read:
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bebereader said
TOfan: Thanks for bringing the links here! I came across the same ones on Sam Hollander’s myspace page when researching this duo. It was fun to re-visit them.
For some reason, Sam Hollander’s information is more readily available than that of his partner, Dave Katz. Finding biographical info on Katz was a real challenge!
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betsy said
I really love your songwriter series Bebe! S*A*M & Sluggo sound like hitmakers. It always cracked me up to imagine them writing on a rooftop. Amongst the pigeons. Creativity FTW!
It also reminds me of a scene in The Producers. 🙂
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Angelica said
Bebewriter,
Love the S*A*M and Sluggo article and all the of songwriters you have researched. 70 writers on The Other Side of Down? Is that normal? That sounds like an awful lot of talent on one album to me and when you factor in the Archulator…hijole!!!
Kaycee,
Your daughter applied for the leading lady role? That is cool, even if she didn’t get selected. Too bad though. We would have had the mom of the leading lady from David’s video giving us the 411. Maybe next time? More videos coming from this album I predict.
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emifriend said
*pictures Bebewriter accepting her Pulitzer Prize after finishing her 70th article for the voice”
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betsy said
I am not sure if this has been posted yet, so here it is:
“One hundred percent of the funds raised through The Classic benefit the Coalition and to date, the event has generated more than $15 million to support domestic violence initiatives in central Ohio. The Classic is a great value for families, while also serving as a significant generator of funds for a critical community initiative”
This is David’s Ohio concert.
Couldn’t love him more.
GAAAHHH
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betsy said
If you want to read more about it:
http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=143450675665994
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Zoe said
Hey Bebe,
Love how you keep us educated by bringing so many great background stories to the site.
Thanks for the little sumthin’ sumthin’ on S*a*m and Sluggo. Quite a successful duo and here’s hoping their collaborative effort with David and Chris DeStefano on SBL will go down in the record books as one of their GREATEST HIT EVER! Gotta hope there will be be more stunners from this group in the future! 🙂
Emmegirl – This is the first I’m reading most of those tweets from Eman and Co. Gotta love the love and respect that peeps in the biz are feeling for David and his talent. Thanks for sharing them!
And YJ – how very cool to have exchanged those tweets with Sam! Let us know if he checks out Bebe’s article and as Emifriend suggested – by all means, invite him and Sluggo to hang out here for a spell. Think they’d appreciate the rarified air around here – much more healthy than those pigeon infested NYC rooftops! 😉
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Zoe said
P.S. to the end of #23:
Even though, as Bebe said: “Once upon a time on a rooftop in New York City, while ducking the pigeons, a song was born. It is something about love. And the rest will be history.” INDEED!!
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bebereader said
YJ#11 Cool exchange you had with Sam Hollander on Twitter! Thank you for tweeting this article to him. I tweeted Eman and LittleEddieOhYeah when their articles were published here. I’ll be curious to know if you hear from Sam Hollander.
Emifriend#30 You make me laugh! 😀
Betsy 22: Thanks for the informative link for The Classic, the Ohio event. “Couldn’t love him more.” <<< You got that right! 😉
Zoe#21 Let's hear it for pigeon-infested rooftops if they can produce gems like SBL! 😀
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bebereader said
“Hey it’s good to be back home again….”
-John Denver
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emmegirl said
Is it tour time yet?
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ram said
Bebe-Love reading about these two. Sam and Sluggo together with our guy-definitely a winning combination. Appreciate the time you take to do the research.
Emme-It’s throw down on a Saturday night. David was really “getting down” Texas style in San Antonio for “Your Eyes Don’t Lie”. Can you feel the heat? lol
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ram said
Ooopsss!
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ram said
I am having major technical difficulties.
If this doesn’t do it, I guess I’ll give up.
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emmegirl said
Ram, I see your Beaumont and raise you a Pittsburgh YEDL.
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bebereader said
Ram: Whoa! Loved that YEDL! Thanks for a great find!
I fixed your ‘technical difficulty’.
To embed a video here, simply click ‘Embed’ on the youtube page, under and to the right of the video. A code will pop up for you to copy and paste right into this comment box.
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emmegirl said
Ram, I just watched your Beaumont again… I may have to fold.
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djafan said
Hello everyone!
Been very busy with family, I should be asleep but been going through some David and David fan withdrawal….lol
Bebe…thank you again for the writer series. I love reading about them and their backgrounds. So lucky for them to have the opportunity to work with David.
So anxious for that music video!!!!
Goodnight all!!!!
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bebereader said
My DVR has been crying for me to delete some old stuff since it’s 90% full. Last night I decided to do it! But I got caught up watching some things I had on it and of course got lost in the moment. This morning, it’s still 90% full. I’ll share with you a sampling of what I watched. My brain knows that these gems are all on youtube and I even have it on dvd but still I cannot delete them from my DVR.
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djafan said
Awwww bebe…the memories.
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Tawna21 said
not such a Silent Sunday here with the videos presented—awww,thanks so much!!
bebe–once again “I be learn-ed” and it’s a feel good feeling!! It really is fun and very interesting to know about all these people. Thank you for going digging for us.
Tawna
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YJfanofdavid said
So I tweeted Sam:
@samiamhollander Check out this article “Something ‘Bout S*A*M and Sluggo” in https://thevoicedavidarchuleta.com/
1:10 PM Jul 17th via web
And he tweeted back!
@YJfan Love it!
about 2 hours ago via web in reply to YJfan
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bebereader said
YJ#38 He likes it; he really likes it!! 😀 😀 😀 😀 😀
Thank you, {{{YJ}}}!
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dakgal said
On this slow moving Sunday evening, I was thinking about Spanish songs I would like to hear David sing–well wonder of wonders–I know no real Spanish songs– duh–so my mind went to English songs with a Spanish flavor. Now, I can’t get this one out of my mind and I would love to hear David sing it. I think he would sound reeeeally good. What this would sound like sung in Spanish I haven’t a clue. This has always been a favorite of mine cause my husband loved to dance to it.
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emifriend said
Aww!! I was hoping that would happen! #38 and #39!So glad they know we are cheering in their corners along with our cheers for David! ( and to have them cheer back in ours!) Must be something ’bout Love that makes that so special.
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tracewillow said
Bebe
Thank you so much for this informative article and for the time you must have spent on the research. I love everyone who works with David – everyone who understands him and gets him and is supportive of him to reach the zenith of the musical world.
Bebe #35
I am not sure whether I’m laughing or crying for you – in short, I feel your dilemma!
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emmegirl said
bebe, I have all of his AI season xfactor videos and I still watch them often, I think I always will. I appreciate what he did on that show now even more than I did then. It also brings back all those feelings of shock and awe when we were first discovering him. And then it helps remind me of his progression and how far he has come and the excitement of what the future, near and far, holds.
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