Official Ultimate Break and/or Beat POLL

Lyn Collins - "Think (About It)"* (1972)

^^ I'm pretty sure I've spent at least a month of my life listening to this break because of Baltimore club music

lots of great ones, but Funky Drummer is so special.

(and i'm pretty sure i've spent a month of my life trying to play it accurately)

i probably should've voted for amen, though. i listen to the o.g. cut of funky drummer a lot but can't remember the last time i listened to something that sampled it.

lyn easy

Are we rating the whole song or just the break? In either case, I voted for Joe Tex.

^^^^ This question is key.

Babe Ruth - "The Mexican" (1973)

tl;dr

this poll needs samples :D

Break = "Think" or "Amen" or "Apache"
Song = literally impossible

The Incredible Bongo Band - "Apache" (1973)

yeah this is impossible, voted 'heaven and hell' purely for that rubberband bass. a million choices here.

balls u remember candy upstairs on clayton st? they had the sorriest selection of rap vinyl ever but they had a sale once where i got every ubb LP for $5 each

This probably should have been done by volume or at least group of volumes because.........

why no 7 Minutes of Funk?

yeah i remember candy, it was michael lachowski's store, more surprised it had anything remotely hiphop at all than the lacking quality.

is that the dude from pylon? he offered to give me ****personal**** lessons in DJing once & i never took him up on it

very ******hands-on******

why no 7 Minutes of Funk?

-- Granny Dainger, Thursday, April 17, 2008 6:15 PM (39 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

^^^^ This question is key.

-- Raw Patrick, Thursday, April 17, 2008 2:16 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Link

I mean, seriously, this was Flash's anthem, and the basis of F5's 1979 Enjoy debut (plus a couple of huge hits for EPMD and Jay-Z hits and inspiration for Whodini's 5 Minutes of Funk).

Crucial.

The Whole Darn Family - "Seven Minutes of Funk" (from Has Arrived ) (1976)

stfu pappawheelie

Fuck. I vote for "Last Night Changed It All". I <3 that song.

(Not that I don't <3 a bunch of others.)

lol yes, that's him. note i'm a HUGE pylon fan but uh, yr story does not surprise, he's started this magazine around town that vaguely like an american apparel catalog only w/ no 'it's a catalog' pretensions ie. basically really really softcore like a bikini mag only w/ like boys in bikeshorts or whatever. we should start a 'creepy old athens icons bizarrely macking on you' thread.

man i looked through that list twice and couldn't find 7 Mins of Funk. My vote should be asterisked.

Are we rating the whole song or just the break? In either case, I voted for Joe Tex.

-- Granny Dainger, Thursday, April 17, 2008 2:55 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Link

i think song personally

This probably should have been done by volume or at least group of volumes because.........

-- The Reverend, Thursday, April 17, 2008 6:40 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Link

funnier not to

"...and at the height of the great LOL recession of 2008, we had to subsist on scraps, like poorly organized poll threads, for what little amusement we could find among the exhausted memes and lazy zings..."

I like "Different Strokes" by Syl Johnson cause it's so versatile!

Opening break - "Criminal Minded"
Opening melody - "Talk Like Sex"
Opening verse - De La's "The Magic Number"
Bridge - "Shame On A N****"

And like 900 other songs too, but it really is like using all the parts of the animal.

going on song alone, i am having a HARD time choosing. narrowed it down to the ones i could remember off the top of my head that i really loved (i'm pretty much over james brown). think i'm gonna go with Delegation

The Winstons - "Amen Brother"* (from MMS-117 7") (1969)
D.C. LaRue - "Indiscreet" (1976)
The Incredible Bongo Band - "Apache" (1973)
Johnny "Hammond" Smith - "Shifting Gears"* (from Gears) (1975)
Melvin Bliss - "Synthetic Substitution"* (1973)
20th Century Steel Band - "Heaven and Hell" (from Warm Heart, Cold Steel) (1975)
Banbarra - "Shack Up" (1975)
Dennis Coffey - "Son of Scorpio"* (1972)
ESG - "U.F.O" (1981)
Billy Squire - "Big Beat" (1980)
Liquid Liquid - "Cavern" (1983)
Mountain - "Long Red"* (1972)
The Whole Darn Family - "Seven Minutes of Funk" (from Has Arrived ) (1976)
Dexter Wansel - "Theme from the Planets"* (1976)
Thin Lizzy - "Johnny the Fox Meets Jimmy the Weed" (1978)
Babe Ruth - "The Mexican" (1973)
Fred Wesley & The J.B.'s - "Blow Your Head" (1974)
Johnny Jenkins - "I Walk On Gilded Splinters" (from Ton Ton Macoute! ) (1974)
Lyn Collins - "Think (About It)"* (1972)
The Black Byrds - "Rock Creek Park" (from City Life) (1975)
K.C. & The Sunshine Band - "I Get Lifted" (1975)
Foster Sylvers - "Misdemeanor" (1973)
Delegation - "Oh Honey" (from Promise of Love) (1977)

No "Impeach The President", jaxon? I am disappointed!

That's a good list otherwise.

as a drummer I feel like the ultimate accomplishment in life would be if some offhand lick you played in the middle of a song gets chopped up and sampled a thousand times and becomes an iconic groove, without you ever dreaming of something like that happening while you were playing it.

i didn't know that you're a drummer, alex.

as a drummer I feel like the ultimate accomplishment in life would be if some offhand lick you played in the middle of a song gets chopped up and sampled a thousand times and becomes an iconic groove, without you ever dreaming of [something like that happening while you were playing it getting paid for it.

haha yeah

yeah probably most of the guys who played the breaks in this poll never saw a cent of royalties, I'm just saying as a personal/musical accomplishment it would be hugely flattering.

i haven't touched my drum set except to move it from one storage space to another in 3 years, but ehh once a drummer always a drummer, constantly a few months away from playing again.

No "Impeach The President", jaxon? I am disappointed!

-- Alex in SF, Friday, April 18, 2008 7:30 PM (11 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

the ones i could remember off the top of my head that i really loved

that song falls into the james brown category of standard dusty 45 funk

Oh I think it's better than that, but whatever.

I think Jordan has the right of it. G. C. Coleman doesn't sound terribly happy about not getting a dime for all this nonsense.

lol yes, that's him. note i'm a HUGE pylon fan but uh, yr story does not surprise, he's started this magazine around town that vaguely like an american apparel catalog only w/ no 'it's a catalog' pretensions ie. basically really really softcore like a bikini mag only w/ like boys in bikeshorts or whatever. we should start a 'creepy old athens icons bizarrely macking on you' thread.

-- balls, Thursday, April 17, 2008 4:59 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Link

lol jerry ayers

http://media3.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/photo/2007/08/09/PH2007080902109.jpg

kind of surprised no one's yet repped for "Ashley's Roachclip"! i kinda grew up thinking that was THE holy grail break beat, as it seemed to be in like every song ever.

i didn't know the song before listening to it right now on youtube, but i instantly recognized the break

as the first comment says: this was the sample of the 90s

or late 80s ... yeah I mean ... from Eric B. & Rakim to Milli Vanilli and Madonna. "Paid in Full" was such a killer track with basically just that beat looped over and over (original version anyway)

it really is impossible to choose. I love them all. I came up with this short list that I want to vote for

Herman Kelly & Life - "Dance to the Drummer's Beat"
Esther Williams - "Last Night Changed it All"
Bar-Kays - "Let's Have Some Fun"
Ralph MacDonald - "Jam on the Groove"
All The People - "Cramp Your Style"

I think I've narrowed it down either "Dance to the Drummer's Beat" or "Jam on the Groove"

I think my favorite "Impeach the President" is one of those album tracks from the DJ Jazzy Jeff & Fresh Prince album that had "Parents just Don't Understand" onit

Drummers don't usually get royalties on song publishing anyway. When James Brown did finally start back-suing for samples, James got the money, not Clyde or Jabo or any of them.

Also...

The Black Motion Picture Experience "2001"

is like whoa.

to be fair, I think milli vanilla/frank farian sampled ashley's roachclip from paid in full

i liked impeach when sampling was severely limited when daddy-o just used one kick, snare, and hi-hat, and created his own break in audio 2's top billin', in super lo-rez no less

only to become a break itself after mary j's real love

If I'm not mistaken, I think credit for Top Billin' goes to Giz, who programmed the sample wrong. Daddy-O just let him keep it.

Also, never ban PappaWheelie

B1g A L1ttl3 A sampled on of my drum beats for a remix they did, and I do have to say it felt pretty awes.

sampling your own breaks is kind of like a girl sending herself flowers :(

gotta be the Hallelujah break

I was just thinking about this the other day. A musician of my generation is probably reacting against the tyranny of MIDI. I personally am trying to get as much sloppy and irrational and physical-sounding stuff into my music (albeit by electronic means). But younger bands coming up now, at least the ones in NYC, are keen to get that shiny early 80s synth sound, all Fairlights and Linn drums, Alex Sadkin, sequencing, Planet Rock, all that stuff from the days when a sampler cost as much as a Rolls Royce. And I can see that, but I'm not ready to go back to the 80s. I'm still reacting against the idiocies of techno and house (the 'hallelujah break', the compressed 909 kick etc).

-- Momus, Saturday, February 16, 2002 8:00 PM (6 years ago) Bookmark Link

thanks for the props whiney

i just sense top billin' was done before they had their hands on the sp1200, which explains the low rez and short sampling time (and the faux idea of "creating your own break" -- more like, you know, figuring out sampling in the early days).

i have friends who've worked with daddy-o and asked about top billin extensively. daddy-o has spoken at length to them about using impeach. i should ask more questions there to get the giz connection.

discussing the 1982 days of fairlight is miles away from the UB&B/1200 thing though.

i always think the discussion of breaks diggers is as important to the discussion of sampling as anything...or i just want to toot my own asshole once again -- i helped do some fact checking/post writing/whatever/not as much as i claim to have on this piece:

http://www.jayquan.com/brakes.htm

also, surprise surprise, posting drunkenly again...

i just know the Giz anecdote from pg. 63 of the Ego Trip Book

http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0312242980/ref=sib_dp_pt#

:D

I'm listening to UB&B 9 right now. I think it might be a personal fave cuz it's the best for aspiring Rubins: dirty longhairs (Billy Squire, Mountain) and artfuccx (Liquid Liquid, ESG and 45 played a 33 1/3) and the Whole Darn Family too

i find it great that roxanne utilized big beat before lenny's comps, giving a name to run-dmc's/larry smith's dmx production style (and later, giving name to chemical bros et al).

proof that breaks culture was always there, more so than baker/robie/man parrish suggested with their choices of including certain "breaks" after bambattaa removed himself from the formula in 1983/1984 (the bottle, soul makossa, etc.).

i mean, baker was a disco producer first and foremost (which explains bam's first record, based on gwen mccrae). Baker purportedly, even tried to convince bam into using d-train's you're the one for me as the break in planet rock. the main reason bam said no was his crew had already created a dance routine to the december 81 tommy boy demo that had super sperm/trans europe express/the mexican in the mix.

i'm drunk...am i making sense?

Totally.

I'm working on my 33 1/3 book (on P.E.) and am reading a lot about producers from 1986-1988 and sort of wondering who was using the original records and who was using the UBBs. I think a lot of dudes were using the originals despite the comps coming out at EXACTLY the same time as all the records that sample them.

i need to stop making sense

voted apache because there was no "P.S.K. What Does it Mean"

HAHAHA at Amazon page on that Ego Trip book:

Key Phrases: rap lists, human beat box, real niggas, Def Jam, Tommy Boy, New York (more...)

Skull Snaps "It's a New Day"

Break sampled for:

Alanis Morissette - "Still"
Alkaholiks - "Bullshit"
Blue Boy - "Remember Me"
Bulldog Breaks - "It's a New School Day"
Black Moon - "Who Got the Props?"
Camp Lo - "Cooley High"
Cornershop - "State Troopers (pt 1)"
Craig Mack - "Real Raw"
Da King & I - "Crack Da Weazel (Dat Other Shit)"
Das EFX - "Mic Checka"
Das EFX - "East Coast"
Deee-Lite - "I Won't Give Up"
Diamond D - "Sally Got a One Track Mind"
DJ Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince - "Twinkle Twinkle"
DJ Shadow - "What Does Your Soul Look Like, Pt 3"
DJ Spooky - "Anansi Abstrakt"
Digable Planets - "For Corners"
Dr. Octagon - "A Visit to the Gynecologyst"
Eric B & Rakim - "Step Back" (Vocals)
Erick Sermon - "The Ill Shit"
Erick Sermon - "Hittin' Switches"
GangStarr - "Take it Personal"
God Lives Underwater - "Fly on the Windscreen"
Gravediggaz - "Mommy, What's a Gravedigga?"
Guru - "Choice of Weapons"
Heavy D - "It's a New Day"
Hieroglyphics - "All Things"
Illegal - "Lights, Camera, Action"
Illegal - "If U Want It"
Kruder & Dorfmeister - "Deep Shit pt. 1 & pt. 2"
Lords of the Underground - "Keepers of the Funk"
Lords of the Underground - "Funky Child"
Luke Vibert - "I Hear the Drummer"
MadKap - "Da Whole Kit & Kaboodle"
MadKap - "Irrelevant"
MF Doom - "Who You Think I Am?"
Mr. Lif - "New Man Theme"
Naked Funk - "Pearls of Compassion"
Naughty by Nature - "Knock 'Em out Da Box"
Nikki D - "Your Man is My Man"
ODB - "Hippa to da Hoppa"
Onyx - "Da Mad Face Invasion"
Onyx - "Getdafukout"
Organized Konfusion - "Who Stole My Last Piece of Chicken?"
Peanut Butter Wolf - "I Will Always Love H.E.R."
Pharcyde - "Passin' Me By"
Prodigy - "Poison"
Public Enemy - "How to Kill a Radio Consultant" (Intro)
Redman - "Watch Yo Nuggets"
Rob D - "Clubbed to Death"
Saafir - "Grab the Train"
Shadz of Lingo - "Ill and Get Clowned"
ShowBiz & A.G. - "Silence of the Lambs"
Stezo - "It's My Turn"
Tim Dog - "I'll Wax Anybody"
Ultramagnetic MC - "Two Brothers with Checks"
Ultramagnetic MC - "One, Two, One, Two"
Vivienne McKone - "Beware" (Passion Fruit Mix)
Wascals - "Hard Rhymes"
Yaggfu Front - "My Dick is So Large"

And that's why I save every piece of information I ever get (provided by Ten12 records when we did the reissue EP in 2005). I think Krush used it too (the break, not the list).

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