“Seven Seconds of Fire” http://www.economist.com/node/21541707

“Amen Brother” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxZuq57_bYM

When I started reading “Seven Seconds of Fire”, I only read part of it as I wanted to first listen to the musical piece with as little bias as possible. As I started the article, I skimmed through a description of “jungle music” and saw the title of the song “Amen Brother” and how it originally wasn’t that popular or successful. Intrigued, I pulled up the song and listened to it.
During my first listening, I noticed a few things. I noticed that it was an instrumental piece with a relatively fast tempo and nice beat to it. It also sounded mostly the same throughout, with the exception for a few seconds in the middle when almost all of the instruments cut out and I was left with this seemingly familiar drum beat. Only after reading the article did I fully understand the significance of these so called “seven seconds of fire”, the “Amen Break”.
In 1986, the New York hip-hop scene, coupled with the advent of the sampler, led this Break to become extremely popular as it was used in many songs as either an underlying loop or a break in the tempo of the song. The Amen Break became a staple in most music around that time, and it still plays a big role even now, in high-tempo music like rap.
The reason why this Break speaks to me, isn’t so much the actual music and beat itself, but how it beautifully represents the way our culture can work. This Break is only seven seconds of an entire song. That song was on the B-side of a track. And that track as a whole was unsuccessful. Yet STILL, this Break is so powerful and influential. It reminds me of how viral videos work: how a small, seemingly insignificant, few seconds can become so fabulously famous and change an entire culture. That aspect of our society, how even the smallest break, in a basic song, in an unsuccessful track can become big and famous, is what makes every person hope and dream and strive to create their own “Seven Seconds of Fire.”