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The pioneering, Grammy award-winning composer, conductor, orchestrator, curator and artist Jules Buckley has teamed up with long-time collaborator and producer Chris Wheeler, Heritage Orchestra and percussion collective Ghost-Note to release album ‘The Breaks’ on Decca Records and focus track ‘The Mexican’ featuring Mattiel – a fresh, energetic take on the track that has been compiled, covered and mixed many times and is considered one of the most influential songs within the Breaking scene.
With hip hop embedded into mainstream culture, the music from ‘The Breaks’ promises to appeal across generations of music fans. There will be a string of singles released from the 15-track album, which is a stunning collection of the much-loved, culture-defining music that birthed the Breaking scene and influenced hip hop and scratch DJs in the Bronx since the1970s. ‘The Breaks’ sees Buckley assemble some stellar featured artists, from Kamasi Washington, Vula and Mr Switch, to Mattiel, Mr Talkbox and US keys impresario Cory Henry. The album follows up the acclaimed ‘The Breaks’ BBC Prom in 2019, which saw B-boys and B-girls take to the stage at Royal Albert Hall alongside Buckley, Heritage Orchestra and Ghost-Note, for an exhilarating and spectacular musical celebration.
‘The Mexican’ by British prog/blues band Babe Ruth was recorded at Abbey Road in 1972, with the lyrics written as a retort to the 1960 western ‘The Alamo’. It has been sampled by the greats from Afrika Bambaataa, The Jungle Brothers, Grandmaster Melle Mel, GZA, Kool Moe Dee to Doug E. Fresh and even The Prodigy, but it was the version created by John “Jellybean Benitez, the superstar producer and remixer of the 80s who worked with Madonna, that made the track famous. Buckley and Heritage Orchestra have infused ‘The Mexican’ with the modern energy and expansion of the orchestral palette, alongside the bold and brilliant vocal delivery from Mattiel.
Among the four pillars of hip hop culture, MC-ing, DJ-ing, graffiti art and breaking, ‘The Breaks’ has its original roots in disco, funk, soul, latin and beyond. All 15 tracks on ‘The Breaks’ album have been continuously mixed, featuring tunes from James Brown & The J.B’s, The Sugarhill Gang, Incredible Bongo Band, Lyn Collins, Zapp, Jimmy Castor Bunch, The Soul Searchers, Herman Kelly & Life, Kool & The Gang, as well as tracks that interweave a number of seminal samples, to delight music lovers, from cratediggers to connoisseurs.
Jules Buckley said “It’s a great moment to finally release ‘The Breaks’, it’s been a labour of love for two years in the making with Chris Wheeler, Heritage Orchestra, Ghost-Note and our incredible featured artists. The aim was to create more than just a homage to the music, but a sonic blueprint for the foundation of a scene that cemented Breaking as one of the four pillars of hip hop culture worldwide. The album’s focus track ‘The Mexican’ is a classic, one of the most recognisable cuts in the scene, it’s exciting to make it a focus track on album release day.”
With a staggering discography of over 70 records, Jules Buckley has worked with some of the hottest names in music and become the widely celebrated, and imitated, originator of innovative, orchestral re-imaginings, blazing a trail across a broad range of genres with his 17 BBC Proms, including his tributes to Quincy Jones, Nina Simone, Scott Walker and Charles Mingus, the 1Xtra Grime Symphony, and the iconic Ibiza Prom, which spawned a major collaboration with Pete Tong and Heritage Orchestra on the globally acclaimed Ibiza Classics live concerts and hugely successful ‘Classic House’ albums, released on Universal Music.
‘The Breaks’ is designed to be listened to non-stop as a continuous mix, and will be released on CD, vinyl and cassette. An unmixed version will also be released digitally.
The Breaks – Tracklisting:
1 Apache
2. It’s Just Begun (feat. Kamasi Washington)
3. Hot Wheels – The Chase
4. Space Funk
5. Think (About it) (feat. Vula and Mr Switch)
6. Forty Days
7. Give It Up Or Turn it Loose (feat. Mr Switch)
8. More Bounce To the Ounce (feat. Mr Talkbox)
9. Get On the Good Foot
10. Ashley’s Roachclip (feat. Cory Henry)
11. Dance to the Drummers Beat
12 Rated X
13 The Mexican (feat. Mattiel) – Focus track
14 Theme from S.W.A.T.
15. X Breaks (feat. Mr Switch)
