These Are the Breaks...

According to D-Monic

words D-MONIC shutter COURTESTY of PURE PHUNK

If you haven't figured it out by now, I'm really into breaks. Like really, really, really into breaks. I have a hard time figuring out sometimes why more people aren't. As we've touched on in previous columns, we've seen that the masses just don't know what breaks are, and that there is a lack of support locally at the moment. What I'd like to address this month is the people who do know what breaks are but don't really “know” them.

I like to stay informed on everything. I read a lot of message boards and I like to keep current on what people like these days. Something I've noticed a lot over the years is that the people that like house, trance, progressive and even drum & bass reallylike their music. They know the artists, they know the songs, they know the labels and they follow their music very closely. On some message boards, some people even post tracklists of sets they heard the previous night. I'm always freaked out a little by that. I don't think that I could listen to someone's breaks set and remember the order of the tunes that the guy played, or even know all the details of all the tunes that were played. Shocking.

The problem that I find almost frustrating in the breaks community is that the average party people know that they like breaks and they know a few key names, but for the most part they don't know what's really going on with the genre as a whole. I find this particularly frustrating as a promoter. I'm constantly approached by a lot of “next big thing” types of artists and they all want to play here, but I know that even if they play for free, no one will come out to see them because the crowds as a whole don't really follow names and new artists. But why?

I see trance and prog parties featuring obscure producers from the middle of nowhere that put out a record once on a rare indie label...and they get a couple hundred people coming out to see them. Why can't we have that level of dedication, education and following in the breaks scene?

I'm a huge advocate for the Internet; it's an awesome tool for searching out new sounds, artists, and whatnot. You can find out every little detail about everyone and everything. I mean, I found a breaks website out there that had info on me, including my shoe size! Don't know how they got that info, but it was correct! It's easy to do the research into the music...but why don't more people do it?

The only real reason I can think of is that breaks is just fun party music. I hear that over and over, so I'm starting to think that people just don't care to know more. Those whodo go to breaks parties know that they're going to have a good time no matter what, so why do they need to know more then that? The sad thing is, I can't really argue with that logic...

But it would be nice if the masses got more into the music then they already are. Maybe they'd like it even more...?