Altsounds - Breakestra - Dusk Til Dawn [Album]

“Dusk Til Dawn” is the new album from Breakestra; an eight-piece outfit from Los Angeles, CA, who play some serious old school Funk music. To get a handle on their sound we have to go back past The Red Hot Chili Peppers, past Prince, past Rick James, all the way back to the P-Funk sound of George Clinton and his contemporaries. Then mix in a fair amount of James Brown too, though I suppose everyone who plays Funk does that to some extent.

The songs on “Dusk Til Dawn” are mainly comprised of cleanly strummed guitar, trumpets, flute, baritone sax, lots of syncopated percussion, and soulful vocals. The sound is mostly old school, but Breakestra does some interesting stuff with it. For one thing, they throw in the occasional cello or violin (‘Me & Michelle,’ ‘I Don’t Wanna Wait,’ ‘You’ll Never Know’), which George Clinton works with now when scoring movie soundtracks, but I don’t know that he used one back in the day. They also tap Chali 2NA (Jurassic 5, Ozomatl) and DJ Dusk for the Funk / Hip Hop blend ‘Posed to Be.’

The musicianship on this album is outstanding. Breakestra creates groove after groove switching from personal love songs, to cool instrumentals, to hip calls for peace and strength. They also clearly enjoy what they’re doing. You can feel the joy even through the studio recordings. I have to imagine a Breakestra show would be non-stop dancing.

If I were asked to provide specific recommendations, I would encourage you to check ‘Dark Clouds Rain Soul,’ ‘Get It Right,’ and the aforementioned ‘Posed to Be.’

"Dusk Til Dawn" is 15 songs long and comes in at over 70 minutes, so it was a lot of Funk to take in all in one sitting. I would recommend this one in your five-disc changer or do what I did and rip a bunch of this great music to your iPod and put it in your party mix.