Ashley’s Roachclip
I'm continuing my tour through hip-hop's most classic breakbeats with "Ashley's Roachclip" by the Soul Searchers. The drum break at 3:36 is one of those hip-hop workhorses, like "Impeach The President" and "The Funky Drummer" and "Apache." It seems like it's always been there.
[youtube=http://youtu.be/1XNr06zoKYg]
The Soul Searchers were led by guitarist Chuck Brown, known in Washington DC music circles as "The Godfather of Go-go." Go-go is a regional flavor of funk using a heavy swing feel and a lot of happening syncopation in the kick drum pattern. Early in my funk connoisseurship, I would have used the go-go beat as the definition of funk. The beat in "Ashley's Roachclip" isn't actually very typical of go-go since it uses straight eighth notes. You can hear a more typical one on Chuck Brown's official web site. The first time I listened to the "Ashley's Roachclip" break I immediately thought of Eric B and Rakim:
Nice & Smooth use the break in "Down The Line" - they mix it with the intro from Charlie Parker and Miles Davis' version of "A Night In Tunisia." Hot!
PM Dawn takes the break in a very different direction by mixing it with "True" by Spandau Ballet for "Set Adrift on Memory Bliss." Don't you feel like PM Dawn is due for a comeback?
The break has attained wide familiarity outside of hip-hop in EMF's "Unbelievable," where it's probably surprised to find itself combined with samples of Andrew Dice Clay. (Sorry, no embedding.)
Some other notable samplers of "Ashley's Roachclip" include:
2 Live Crew - "Ghetto Bass II"
3rd Bass - "Oval Office"
Color Me Badd - "Choose"
Cutty Ranks - "The Stopper"
Eazy-E - "Gimme That Nutt"
Geto Boys - "Scarface"
Ice Cube - "Jackin' for Beats"
LL Cool J - "Jack The Ripper"
Milli Vanilli - "All Or Nothing," "Blame It On The Rain" and "Girl You Know It's True" (Milli Vanilli!)
Moby - "First Cool Hive"
Run-DMC - "Run's House"
Another fun Chuck Brown/Soul Searchers fact: the beat from their song "Bustin' Loose (Part 1)" was used by Nelly for "Hot In Herre."
Sample culture is the best.
Update: RIP Chuck Brown.