Breakbeat | Muzik Magazine

There are some super-groovy and lively beats to be gleaned from this month's top sample CD release, "Breakbeat - Absolutely Authentic Breaks". Big Fish Audio has put together over 70 minutes of breakbeats for this huge collection and ponder in the sleeve notes the difference between a drum loop and a breakbeat. Some say it's hidden in the depths of the vinyl - the warm, cozy and crackly home of many classic funky breaks, while others claim it's the Seventies recording processes - "funky old tube compression and drum sets milked up with just a stereo pair straight to two-inch" as the sleeve so rightly states. Or maybe drummers just aint as funky as they were back in the day.

Whichever, BFA has imbued their royalty-free selection of sampler food with the same kind of warmth, funk, dynamics and downright oddness which make those rare groove breaks leap right off the turntable and straight into your sampler before you've even noticed.

The drum patterns have that spacious, live sound and are presented with all manner of different hues and tones - thumping kick drums, compressed air-sucking snares, ear-splitting thick old hi hats. Many of the loops are played over 16 bars with the funk injected into the jugular, ideal for putting life into songs which plod through repetitive four bar patterns and with sampler memory cheaper than bags of crisps these days, you can afford lavish, long loops at the heart of your mixers.