The Amen Break is a short drum riff that provides the cool beat for just about anything ... and that's the trouble with it as the advent of samplers meant it was used for just about everything ... but nobody paid a dime in royalties to The Winstons, the band that recorded it for "Amen, Brother." (BBC: Six seconds that shaped 1,500 songs)
Hipsters have flogged the egregious ripoff of this for years and the reason for mentioning it now is that some people are trying to make it right. You can find the details in the article and hopefully you're in a position to do something. People have started taking up a collection and it's up to about $20K but that's peanut dust relative to what would have been made if copyrights were honored.
While The Winstons have no resentment after all this time, I do as you make your music and you present it hoping people will dig it. You don't expect people will copy it or bits and pieces of it to use in something they call original. You really can't copyright six seconds of something as otherwise people could say they have the copyright on saying 'have a nice day' and then sue anyone who ever said it. Nevertheless, it wasn't fair and still isn't.
Part of the reason the riff is so common is that it's even in drum machines. Just push a button and Amen, Brother.
The musicology of this doesn't matter much to me as my concern is fair's fair ... and this ain't. Hopefully you can throw a few dollars toward their campaign and note The Winstons didn't start it, this came about from people who cared enough to try to make things right.
Hipsters have flogged the egregious ripoff of this for years and the reason for mentioning it now is that some people are trying to make it right. You can find the details in the article and hopefully you're in a position to do something. People have started taking up a collection and it's up to about $20K but that's peanut dust relative to what would have been made if copyrights were honored.
While The Winstons have no resentment after all this time, I do as you make your music and you present it hoping people will dig it. You don't expect people will copy it or bits and pieces of it to use in something they call original. You really can't copyright six seconds of something as otherwise people could say they have the copyright on saying 'have a nice day' and then sue anyone who ever said it. Nevertheless, it wasn't fair and still isn't.
Part of the reason the riff is so common is that it's even in drum machines. Just push a button and Amen, Brother.
The musicology of this doesn't matter much to me as my concern is fair's fair ... and this ain't. Hopefully you can throw a few dollars toward their campaign and note The Winstons didn't start it, this came about from people who cared enough to try to make things right.
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