Is ‘It Takes Two’ the new Amen break?

Is ‘It Takes Two’ the new Amen break?

10 March, 2009 | 5.56PM

• Written by: Beatportal
• Filed under: Music News: dj ez, rob base, sampling

Following on from the facinating video we hosted last week in which Nate Harrison examined the collosal impact of the ‘Amen’ break upon popular music, we decided to do a bit of our own breakbeat-driven analysis.

We have noticed that there appears to be a growing trend centered around a break that will most readily be recognizable from Rob Base and DJ Ez-Rock’s 1988 classic ‘It Takes Two’. Unsurprisingly, their sample was lifted from a 1969 James Brown produced track by Lyn Collins entitled ‘Think (About It)’ which featured the distinctive “Woah! Yeah!” as screamed by Brown.

In fact the track was arguably first sampled by Roxanne Shante in the same year as ‘It Takes Two’ on the less-famous ‘Roxanne’s On A Roll’. 

Needless to say, the break has been pilfered countless times since, popping up on tracks by Janet Jackson, Slick Rick, EPMD, Dizzee Rascal and Fatman Scoop.

So what does all of this have to do with modern electronic dance music?

Well, in a relatively short period of time we managed to uncover ten recent examples of tracks that used the break to one effect or another; five of which were released in the first few months of 2009. The genres range from drum and bass and dubstep through to indie dance and most consistently electro house, which accounts for seven of the examples we collected. This is of course only the tip of the iceberg with countless other takes on the break floating around record stores worldwide.

So is this break becoming to electro house what the Amen break is to jungle? Or are we simply running out of ideas? Have a listen in the player below and decide for yourself. 

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