What's Brokenbeat then?

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Please define.

― colin s barrow (colin s barrow), Friday, 2 May 2003 03:45 (twenty-one years ago) link

i might be wrong but i think the word's misleading. I think it refers to that brazillian influenced semi house-y jazz stuff. like, um, jazzanova.

― gaz (gaz), Friday, 2 May 2003 04:33 (twenty-one years ago) link

Stuff that's not downtempo enough to be labelled downtempo, I guess.

― Mil, Friday, 2 May 2003 07:06 (twenty-one years ago) link

broken beat IS people records, from west london. the chief exponent is IG Culture. to me jazzanova exist on a slightly different plane. its pretty garage-y tpo be honbest, which is why i was attracted to it. its like garage, but with loads of jazzy 'la la la's and sax/rhodes etrc ALL OVER THE PLACE. essential tune: new sector movements 'my history (afor history why?)'. also this tune is great. 2000 black is a nother spinoff label. a few years ago it was pretty much exclusively coming out of west london. i havent listened to this stuff for ages. two more to check: landslide - the 'betcha did' remix of...bollocks i cant think who the orignial is by - landslidew is the improbably crossing-over-into-mainstream-garage kid, as in being sold in all hardcore garage shops. zed bias also does some stuff on sirkus, cant remember his moniker. thinking about jazzanova, some of the stuff they have done is pretty much the same of thing as broken beat, esp. the 'burnin' remix (this is pretty good actually), but the broken beat name to me refers pretty much to that west london/ladbroke grove scene.

question: when will seiji start collaborating ed-case?

― ambrose (ambrose), Friday, 2 May 2003 07:29 (twenty-one years ago) link

check out tom churchill's emoticon label for some nice broken beat (amongst other things) stuff

― tylero, Friday, 2 May 2003 07:35 (twenty-one years ago) link

s'funny, a few years ago "broken beat" meant stuff like somatic responses, ambush records, praxis records, etc.

― your null fame (yournullfame), Friday, 2 May 2003 08:19 (twenty-one years ago) link

whys the beat broken though?

― gaz (gaz), Friday, 2 May 2003 08:53 (twenty-one years ago) link

Yes, exactly Gaz, please tell us which bit of the beat is broken and how.

― colin s barrow (colin s barrow), Friday, 2 May 2003 09:59 (twenty-one years ago) link

As groove-based as broken beat is, most of the scene's productions have chopped-up/spluttery/stuttering beats that are often polyrhythmic. Jazz-funk, jungle, Afrobeat, hip-hop, R&B and a few other styles enter the mix. It remains a predominantly vinyl-based strain, so it hasn't received much exposure outside of the underground. Two other major factors: many of the key producers change names from release to release, and most of the supportive journalists turn readers off with 'soulful' overuse. Some other labels include Laws of Motion, Neroli, Bitasweet, Main Squeeze, Visions, etc. Those who are interested in the scene but run from the clean/tasteful jazz-funk ties should check out Scattered Snares, a comp released last year on Dego's Twisted Funk label; some of the tracks are much closer to moody Detroit techno than watered down '70s Donald Byrd or whatever.

― Andy K (Andy K), Friday, 2 May 2003 11:04 (twenty-one years ago) link

Some of my favorite broken beat tracks:

Afronaught - Transcend Me
4hero - Hold It Down [Bugz in the Attic Mix]
Mustang - Transitions
Agent K - Betcha Did (w/ vox by Izzi Dunn, who I think did the original???)
Likwid Biskit - Substance
Seiji - Loose Lips
Titonton - Avenues
Moonstarr - Scoliosis
Numbers - Either-Or
New Sector Movements - Download This
Kabuki - Tempest
Recloose - Ain't Changin'
SK Radicals - On the Street [Volcov 4-4-2 Remix]

Of course I forgotten to mention the heavy house and electo elements of broken beat.

The best broken-beat mix available, to my knowledge, is Alex Attias' Selector Series, Vol. 1 (Goya).

― Andy K (Andy K), Friday, 2 May 2003 11:11 (twenty-one years ago) link

I have never heard any. It it precipitate then to say I'm disappointed? It is? Well, I only want to say that I had something much more radical in mind, from the name alone. I imagined some kind of savage cuts being made to the groove within each bar - like, liberal use of the erase button, but repetitively, so the same bit was erased out of the drum pattern in each bar.

― colin s barrow (colin s barrow), Friday, 2 May 2003 11:37 (twenty-one years ago) link

colin, sounds like you want something like soundhack or errorsmith, if you want that kind of rupture while retaining a dance groove. otherwise, if you want something noisier, go for breakcore... broken beat has never proposed that kind of radicalism (and indeed many of its figures shied away from the term "broken beat" at all until it became clear that it wasn't going away); it's really a mutation of post-techno, breakbeat oriented music facing several directions at once. at its best (IG Culture, seiji) it's breathtaking; at its worst (rima) it's awful nujazz tripe. i, too, would like to see more collabs between broken beaters and garage producers.

― philip sherburne (philip sherburne), Friday, 2 May 2003 16:40 (twenty-one years ago) link

Thanks Philip, will check out the names you mentioned. As for my misconception of brokenbeat and what it entailed, what occurred to me is that it might be interesting to try sampling loops of my own or others' grooves, then randomly clear a little bit of the sample data to make a gap in the loop. Could sound good.

Enjoying your column, which I recently discovered.

― colin s barrow (colin s barrow), Saturday, 3 May 2003 05:22 (twenty-one years ago) link

i, too, would like to see more collabs between broken beaters and garage producers

When the two sounds collide, for example on Gypo - Mark Force, Check da Vibe - Nubian Mindz and most anything Maddslinky (aka Zed Bias) the results tend to be terrific.

― JoB (JoB), Saturday, 3 May 2003 09:47 (twenty-one years ago) link

many of the key producers change names from release to release

Who's who in broken beats.

― JoB (JoB), Saturday, 3 May 2003 09:49 (twenty-one years ago) link

yes mark force's gypo is surprisingly good

i think this stuff suffers terribly from overlords 4hero's tying things into black music history neurosis ---> megalomania thing

always wanting to build on or reclaim things

― Chip Morningstar (bob), Saturday, 3 May 2003 11:32 (twenty-one years ago) link

bugz in the attic are at least trying to break out of the 'ladbroke groove' ghetto by being superindustrious of late

i had a soft spot for the awfully titled ne-grove

but kaidi tatham is the secret link

― Chip Morningstar (bob), Saturday, 3 May 2003 11:37 (twenty-one years ago) link

eight months pass...

i'm really into the bugz in the attic fabric mix (in fact its playing right now). can anyone offer some more mix suggestions that are in this same vein? i'm going to check andy's recommendation upthread, but more suggestions would be welcome indeed.

― tricky disco (disco stu), Saturday, 31 January 2004 17:04 (twenty years ago) link

did ile's kate play instrument on a 2 banks of 4 track!

― prima fassy (bob), Saturday, 31 January 2004 17:11 (twenty years ago) link

seven months pass...

has anyone heard domu/umod's enter the umod? not really broken beat, more like a better than average dabrye or the album i've been wanting wagon christ to make since throbbing pouch. is good!

oh and andy was sooo right about scattered snares.

― jess (dubplatestyle), Sunday, 26 September 2004 02:46 (nineteen years ago) link

one year passes...

okay so what from the last year do i need to hear?

― strng hlkngtn: what does it mean? (dubplatestyle), Friday, 14 October 2005 16:34 (eighteen years ago) link

From 2005, I can only think of

BoxSaga featuring Lyrical L & Andrea Clarke – “Back Inside” (Nonstop)
Hexstatic featuring Juice Aleem – “Distorted Minds (Zero dB Mix)” (Ninja Tune)
Mark de Clive-Lowe - “Slide” (Antipodean/ABB Soul)

Unless you count Switch/Solid Groove (and/or Maurice Fulton/Syclops), which is where the momentum is when it comes to sort of off-beat dance music. I can’t remember the last time I bought a People/Bitasweet related release. It’s over, and it has been for a couple of years.

― JoB (JoB), Friday, 14 October 2005 17:30 (eighteen years ago) link

I thought somebody fixed that broken beat a while ago but I did hear "Fog" by Enterplay (Arm/Libyus), which is actually an old track by Ianeq. Appreciated in Wire mag (I'm guessing by Philip) and I mention this because although I write their promo I'm not street-teaming, the track is fine.

― blunt (blunt), Friday, 14 October 2005 17:37 (eighteen years ago) link

one year passes...

i just ordered a load of oldish broken beat stuff for quite cheap. hope its half decent. i tend to find a lot of it really dissapointing though. prefer the instrumental stuff by far, by and large. is there anything new worth checking out or has the scene just ended up becoming the new acid jazz?

― titchyschneider (titchyschneider), Friday, 9 February 2007 13:53 (seventeen years ago) link

I quite liked the Bugz in the Attic album, although it is more song-ish than their remixes.

― Michael F Gill (Michael F Gill), Friday, 9 February 2007 16:01 (seventeen years ago) link

Bugz album is a grower, although i was a bit dissapointed that it didn't have any seriously neck-snapping tracks on it. although "Move Aside" is great. The scene is alive on CDR in DJ's cases, but not really on vinyl or any other format unfortunately. Haven't heard too much that made me bug out, though a recent appearance by Daz I Kue here in SF had me freaking to a bunch of new "Bloodfire" tracks, that is, boot remixes done by Daz himself. Seek those 12s out.

Domu is still on fire, I'd recommend pretty much any remix with his name on it, as well as tracks on his new label Trebleo (which has a download shop, usually full of tracks unavailable anywhere else).

There's a new Scattered Snares compilation due sometime in the near future. Let's hope there are more Somatik tracks on it, as he was one of the up-and-coming bright lights in the scene (his last two EPs, now a few years old at least, were completely essential)

I caught up with Seiji on Myspace recently, and it seems he was out of the loop during the making of the Bugz album, and has since dropped out of making broken beat, instead focusing on producing a few vocalists and honing his production techniques for a more commercial audience (presumably to make some cash). We go back a bit, and he asked me to tip him to what's happening in music lately since he's not really listened to any dance stuff in the past few years (feeling more of the rock end of the spectrum, which is no surprise). I told him to check out the Emperor Machine, and he said he'd get on it. Would be great if some Seiji-esque disco emerged from that. :)

otherwise what is there, really? Mark de Clive-Lowe has been pumping out tracks & remixes but few of them really grab me. a 12" by Blakai ft Bembe Segue (Blakai = Mark G-Force + Kaidi Tatham) called Afrospace was really the last broken record that had me super excited. Got to be three years on from that now....

― mikebee (heywood), Friday, 9 February 2007 19:54 (seventeen years ago) link

three years pass...

Been trying to post-mortem this stuff recently, find it super-difficult though to guess in advance what I'm gonna totally adore and what I'm gonna nod off to. When it's on it's ON but most of the stuff I really love (Alex Attias Selector Series mix, Bugz in the Attic Fabric mix and their first remix comp, 4 Hero's Creating Patterns, Vikter Duplaix's singles comp) I've loved for time, and I'm struggling to find stuff that I like as much as those, as pleasant and accomplished as Neon Phusion, DKD and Agent K albums etc. undoubtedly are.

I guess the secret thread to the stuff i like is (how boring) the R&B/garagey connection - really sharp beats.

Targeted recommendations much appreciated.

― Tim F, Monday, 18 October 2010 09:01 (thirteen years ago) link

five years pass...

http://www.nts.live/shows/spacebass/episodes/spacebass-broken-beat-special-10th-september-2016

👍

― r|t|c, Monday, 12 September 2016 16:40 (seven years ago) link

four years pass...

this looks like an interesting new comp:

https://www.zrecords.ltd.uk/2020/08/announcing-breaking-the-beats-a-personal-selection-of-west-london-sounds/

― brimstead, Tuesday, 29 September 2020 01:34 (three years ago) link

i thought so too but the vinyl tracklist didn't look great when it finally came out

― the late great, Tuesday, 29 September 2020 01:37 (three years ago) link

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