[HN Gopher] A History of the Amen Break: From the Winstons to Fu...
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A History of the Amen Break: From the Winstons to Futurama and Om
Unit
Author : thunderbong
Score : 78 points
Date : 2023-09-02 13:00 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (splice.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (splice.com)
| tecleandor wrote:
| Although the Amen Break is nearly omnipresent, I think the
| Futurama mention is misguided.
|
| The rhythm in Futurama is the same as in the song it's based on:
| Psyche Rock by Pierre Henry. That song was published two years
| before Amen Brother.
|
| Although the rhythm sounds very similar, Futurama's (or Pierre
| Henry's) precisely lacks Amen Break's characteristic syncopation
| on its fourth bar.
| whstl wrote:
| Not really, the drums of the Futurama Theme are indeed sampled
| from the Amen Break, together with some bongos from Rapper's
| Delight.
|
| Psyche Rock was sampled for the bells.
|
| Check out this breakdown/remake and compare with the 30s theme:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qoq5-bLYM5Q
|
| (EDIT: It is even easier to hear the Amen Break in the extended
| version, check this site for the timestamps:
| https://www.whosampled.com/sample/808/Christopher-Tyng-Futur...
| )
|
| Also keep in mind that the original Psyche Rock is this one:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vb32bdQJBxM
|
| ...and not this 1997 remix by Fatboy Slim, which is the first
| result in Youtube for Psyche Rock, and also has an Amen-ish
| break, and sounds indeed close to the Futurama theme:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qssa6ec7faQ
| timeon wrote:
| > Although the Amen Break is nearly omnipresent
|
| I thought that break-beat was not present last decade as much
| as it was between 1990-2010.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| wturner wrote:
| I grew up during a time when funky drummer felt way more
| pervasive as a break
| aswanson wrote:
| Late 60s, early 70s had the best combination of technology &
| limitations to create some of the most memorable music. Go much
| earlier than that & everything sounds hollow. Too much later (
| I'm looking at you, 1980s) and everything is polished & synthetic
| to phoniness.
| Kye wrote:
| Every generation seems to think the technical limitations of
| their era produced superior art; the previous generation was
| always too limited, and the following always have it too easy.
| They might be right for themselves, but it's clear the
| situation is much more subjective than the absolutes that get
| thrown around.
|
| The 1980s gave us samplers that could only do a few seconds of
| audio, and entire genres were built on it.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJf9Jptq7VY
|
| People who came up then probably feel the same way you do, but
| about samplers with no practical limits.
| Lio wrote:
| You're making an assumption that the parent's age and
| ignoring the possibility that they actually just think that
| the 60s/70s had the best combination of technical ability to
| limitation.
|
| I came up in the 90s (that's actually when sampler based
| music really took off vs using turntables or tape to loop
| things).
|
| I still think the 60s/70s had better trade off between
| limitation to technical capabilities. Studio time used to be
| unbelievably expensive, so people didn't mess around.
|
| I love Goldie's Inner City Life (1994) and DJ Shadow's
| Endtroducing, they really changed things for me. Neither
| would be the same if they didn't have the source material to
| sample from.
| MaxBorsch228 wrote:
| One of the classic "break dance" tracks (although not as
| prominent as Funky drummer, Apache, or Think about it breaks).
| nvm0n2 wrote:
| The different examples really make the steady liquification of
| drum and bass over time clear. Yeah there's still a subgenre of
| really hard stuff but in the 90s it was all like that, just amen
| break over really dark metal/industrial kind of sounds. The
| melodic gap between Vic Acid and the Sub Focus remix is
| indicative, as dnb artists got older they got more classical
| training and started to focus on less harsh, more ethereal sounds
| and way more unique melodies (sadly often lost in the club
| environment).
|
| I guess the success of Hold Your Colour was a turning point.
| Although even that has quite a harsh sound compared to some of
| the stuff the DNB scene produces today.
| afro88 wrote:
| > in the 90s it was all like that, just amen break over really
| dark metal/industrial kind of sounds
|
| There was actually a whole scene from the start of the 90s that
| focussed on melodic and atmospheric jungle and dnb. Check out
| Good Looking Records. In fact even Metalheadz pushed some this
| sound a lot. I personally see that as a fundamental part of
| jungle and dnb from the get go.
| nvm0n2 wrote:
| I think GLR was the only label for a very long time that did
| that stuff though. I remember listening to DNB stations in
| the 90s and they were all very dark compared to today, I
| don't think there was any easy way to find out about liquid
| in those days for someone not deeply into the scene. I think
| that didn't change much until Fabio and Grooverider got their
| late night show on Radio 1 and wanted to make dnb more
| accessible, even so, I remember tuning in sometimes and just
| having to turn it off because it was too hardcore. It wasn't
| until I got fast enough internet and found online radio
| specializing in dnb that I really got into dnb but that was
| considered super obscure and there were only a handful of
| stations, and of those, only occasional shows played liquid.
| So I definitely feel it got more common since then.
| plasma_beam wrote:
| Recommend checking out ASC and Aural Imbalance for modern
| takes on amen/GLR sound. They release under the Auxiliary
| label (search Bandcamp for them). A lot of DnB heavyweights
| are starting to bring back the 90s "intelligent" dnb sound
| recently. Really great to listen to. Nine Windows (collab
| between Kid Drama and DJ Trace) are another excellent
| example (also on Bandcamp).
|
| https://auxiliary.bandcamp.com/music
|
| https://ninewindows.bandcamp.com/album/rule-of-thirds
| plasma_beam wrote:
| Some DnB "OGs" such as Dom and Roland, Paradox are still
| heavy proponents of the amen sound, and can toss it up
| between darkish, breakbeaty and soulful tracks.
|
| Long time DnB fan, since late 90s.
|
| https://paradoxmusicuk.bandcamp.com/
|
| https://over-shadow.bandcamp.com/music
| djhope99 wrote:
| Sadly "The Winstons" received no money for the sample. Tragic
| that the genius behind this revolution got absolutely nothing.
| atlanta90210 wrote:
| Last remaining member received $22k. Not enough.
|
| https://www.vice.com/en/article/rmje4q/amen-breakbeat-fundra...
| TacticalCoder wrote:
| What about this one, is this the amen break but super slow? (it's
| from 1968 and it's close no?)
|
| https://youtu.be/6L5wJfQrK2E
| rahimnathwani wrote:
| Another song that's been sampled _a lot_ is La Di Da Di, by Slick
| Rick and Doug E. Fresh, which came out when I was in primary
| school:
|
| https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-la-di-da-di-a-b-side-from-1...
| Other frequently sampled songs typically have a single element,
| like a drumbeat or a vocal shout, that is used again and again.
| Part of what makes "La Di Da Di" unusual is how many different
| lines from the five-minute track have wormed their way into
| popular music.
|
| Slick Rick's other tracks are also emulated. You probably know
| 'This is how we do it' by Montell Jordan. This not only has a
| repeated music sample from "Children's Story", but also a verse
| in the style of the opening:
|
| Children's Story: Once upon a time not long ago
| When people wore pajamas and lived life slow When laws were
| stern and justice stood And people were behavin' like they
| ought ta good There lived a lil' boy who was misled
| By anotha lil' boy and this is what he said "Me and you Ty,
| we're gonna make sum cash Robbin' old folks and makin' the
| dash"
|
| This is how we do it: Once upon a time in '94
| Montell made no money and life sure was slow All they said
| was 6' 8" he stood And people thought the music that he
| made was good There lived a D.J. and Paul was his name
| He came up to Monty, this is what he said You and O.G. are
| gonna make some cash Sell a million records and we're
| makin' tha dash
| joshuamorton wrote:
| See also https://www.ted.com/talks/mark_ronson_how_sampling_tra
| nsform..., a good ted talk on this (that the WSJ article is
| probably inspired by)
| atlanta90210 wrote:
| 17 Years ago this audio/video explained it all. Props to the
| artist Landon for laying down the audio to a record and playing
| the audio (with examples) from the record. 6.8 millions views -
| the Winstons will never be forgotten.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SaFTm2bcac&t=3s
| Nition wrote:
| It's a mini-documentary by Nate Harrison from 2004, that 2006
| version is just the first YouTube upload of it.
| chris_st wrote:
| Really recommend 12tone's music analysis (building the break up
| from the individual drum grooves) [0]. Their videos are always
| fantastic; it's an amazing level of musical analysis. That said,
| not everyone likes their style of presentation.
|
| [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwOs4aM6upA
| rudyfink wrote:
| If you're interested in more, this is a nice and short
| documentary (2014) on the Amen Break:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SaFTm2bcac
| alsetmusic wrote:
| My first attempt to load the video was met with an ad so I
| killed the yt app on my phone. I'm assuming this is the one
| narrated by a fellow with a deep voice and an acetate record.
| Timing would be about right. If so, this is a phenomenal look
| at the evolution of its place in music that I also was going to
| link in this thread.
|
| Music history.
| rzzzt wrote:
| Deep voice person is Nate Harrison, you can also watch it on
| archive.org:
| https://archive.org/details/NateHarrisonCanIGetAnAmen
| cpach wrote:
| 2004 :)
| jonny_eh wrote:
| Wow, event the video on Youtube was from February 2006, must
| be one of the oldest videos there.
| bretbernhoft wrote:
| The Amen Break is (in my understanding) one of the more important
| fragments of music in modern history. As there is a common,
| golden thread that began seventy years ago in Jamaica. Which runs
| all the way up into the modern day as Drum And Bass music and
| beyond.
|
| The Amen Break is part of a special story, one of fusing human
| cultures from around the planet into a common sound. I encourage
| people to do a bit of research here, it's worth your time.
|
| Thank you for the great article and excellent subject.
| theNewMicrosoft wrote:
| Classic Amen
|
| https://invidious.lunar.icu/watch?v=1lHlxKgwLSE
| comprev wrote:
| A pleasant surprise to see Om Unit pop up on HN :-)
|
| Amen Break is just one of dozens used in jungle/d&b mind.
|
| Here's one of my favourite tracks under his Mahakala alias - The
| Exodus (2018)
|
| [Track] https://youtu.be/DYKUU-AsHvM
|
| [Discogs] https://www.discogs.com/release/12603789-Mahakala-The-
| Exodus...
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