ROCK Sex: "Amen Break" - How 6 Seconds From 1969 Propel All Modern Music

ROCK Sex says, Refine the past to redefine the future.

This is the catalyst for all culture and creativity.

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In 1969, a Funky Soul group called The Winstons had a Top 10 hit with their song "Colour Him Father". The B-side was an instrumental called "Amen, Brother", and its drum solo became the basis for at least 1500 songs across the following decades!

You've heard it in everything, and you don't even know it.

Nate Harrison breaks it all down in his excellent video thesis.

"I find this quite interesting. Hundreds of tracks, dozens of DJs, a number of clubs and events, in effect an entire subculture- based on this one drumbeat. I mean, based on six seconds from 1969."

- NATE HARRISON

-"Video explains the world's most important 6-second drum loop" (2004)



(excerpt:)

"During the '80s, when DJs plundered old Jazz and R'n'B records looking for samples, HipHop music in particular and Electronic music in general were not the Pop phenomena and moneymakers we know them as today.

There seemed to be a brief few sort-of glory years back then, when the novelty of sampling and the rate at which it was being employed as a new technique proved faster than the rate at which any sort of copyright bureaucracy could maintain the law. Older bits of sampling were appropriated, perhaps under the assumption of their being able to be freely used, in the spirit of a pledge to new forms.

In other words, sampling was not seen as simply rehashing past sounds, but as an attempt to make new from something old, an artistic strategy as time-honored as creativity itself.*

Only when these Urban forms started receiving a lot of attention and making a lot of money did people and -more importantly- Corporate bigwigs who held the copyrights to much of the back catalog of contemporary American music start cracking down on copyright violation."

© Nate Harrison, 2004.

> Nate Harrison's thesis and installation


*(italics mine)

Like the "Apache" break beat, the "Amen Corner" break is a timeless creation continually being redefined into the future.




© Tym Stevens

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See Also:

• ROCK Sex: "APACHE", HipHop's Sacred Secret Beat! - Bongo Band > Bambaataa > EVERYONE EVER

• "Sing A Simple Song" - Sly Stone > Jimi Hendrix > James Gang > P-Funk > Chili Peppers > Public Enemy

• "Good Times!" - Chic > SugarHill Gang > Queen > Defunkt > Ting Tings

• ROCK Orgy: "Genius of Love"


• The Real History of Rock and Soul!: The Music Player Checklist

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ROCK Sex: "APACHE", HipHop's Sacred Secret Beat! - Bongo Band > Bambaataa > EVERYONE EVER

ROCK Sex is vibing tribal.

"Apache" is one of the most sampled songs in Rap history.

But the song has a crazy 50 year history that covers Surf, Psychedelia, Electronic, Funk, and especially HipHop.

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Geronimo

America was big on Westerns in the 1950s. Flush with wealth and power in the wake of WWII, it mythologized its roots in endless films and television series. The driving theme songs of these became staples in Rock'n'Roll guitar bands in the late '50s and early '60s.

"Apache" was written by brit Jerry Lordan, inspired by the 1954 film of the same name. It was first publicly performed on tour by BERT WEEDON.

BERT WEEDON -"Apache" (1960)



The UK guitar greats THE SHADOWS opened for Weedon on that tour and adapted the song to their style. The bold use of atmospheric echo and stocatto twang helped set the template for Surf music. This song is Dick Dale before Dick Dale.

THE SHADOWS -"Apache" (1960)



While that was a big splash in England, in America it was a big hit for a danish guitarist named Jorgen Ingmann. Listen to the amazing use of electronic effects throughout. Joe Meek must have been thunderstruck.

JORGEN INGMANN -"Apache" (1961)



The song was now a Rock standard; check out Los Pekenikes of Spain (1961), the inevitable response by The Ventures (1962), a vocal version by Sonny James (1962), and the fuzzrock biker-theme king Davie Allan And The Arrows (1965).


But what would happen if you crossed "Apache" with Captain Beefheart's "Dropout Boogie"? We've often wondered and now we'll know.

EDGAR BROUGHTON BAND -"Apache Dropout" (1970)



Or if you made an all-Moog electronic take?

HOT BUTTER -"Apache" (1972)



Enough people were doing variations of it that no one could have suspected the impossibly far-reaching impact of this particular Latin-Funk-Rock expansion on it.

INCREDIBLE BONGO BAND -"Apache" (1973)



But DJ Kool Herc, Afrika Bambaataa, and other DJs in mid-'70s New York did. It was a secret weapon in their vinyl arsenal as they used its beats to pump up block parties and clubs in the dawning days of HipHop. Bambaataa would disguise the labels of his records so no one could swipe his sources. But eventually the word got out and the first Rap single to pave the path was...

SUGARHILL GANG -"Apache" (1981)


When Sugarhill Gang yells, "Hot butter popcorn", it is a shout-out to the Moog band, HOT BUTTER, (see above) and their hit "Popcorn". That toast has since become a running joke in Rap songs, from Funky Four Plus 1 to The Beastie Boys.

But nothing compared to the infinite reach of Incredible Bongo Band's "Apache" itself which has become the source of 78% of the songs for the past three decades. Okay, that's not strictly true, but a massive amount of them!

Like who? Samplers include West Street Mob, Full Force, LL Cool J, 2 Live Crew, Grandmaster Flash, Bomb the Bass, MC Hammer, Neneh Cherry, Run-DMC, Dan the Automator, Young MC, C+C Music Factory, The Blow Monkeys, Tone Loc, Blur, En Vogue, Boogie Down Productions, Mick Jagger, Stereo MC's, TLC, David Bowie, The Notorious B.I.G, Beastie Boys, The Future Sound of London, Faith Evans, The Prodigy, Luscious Jackson, Moby, David Arnold, Rage Against the Machine, Amy Winehouse, The Roots, Mike Patton and X-Ecutioners, M.I.A., Guru, Raekwon, Madonna, Jay-Z and Kanye West, Panteras Negras, Willy Moon, and your cousin. To name only a few.


But, you're asking, what if The Shadows, Jorgen Ingmann, Davie Allan, and The Incredible Bongo Band all jammed together on "Apache" at Sugar Hill studios? Well, here's two members of Portishead to answer that musical question.

THE JIMI ENTLY SOUND -"Apache" (2002)



The entire Incredible Bongo Band album was remade by Shawn Lee's Incredible Tabla Band, with Indian percussion and instruments.

Shawn Lee's INCREDIBLE TABLA BAND -"Apache" (2011)



Point out the samples when they blast out at your next party (and they will), and impress your friends!



© Tym Stevens

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See Also:

• "AMEN Break" - How 6 Seconds From 1969 Propels All Modern Music


• "Soul Makossa" - Manu Dibango > Trovaioli > Michael Jackson

• ROCK Orgy: "Genius of Love"

• "Scorpio" - Dennis Coffey > Grandmaster Flash > Public Enemy> Moby

• "Good Times!" - Chic > SugarHill Gang > Queen > Defunkt > Ting Tings


• The Real History of Rock and Soul!: A Music Player Checklist

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