Break Up, Throw Down

Old electronic music genres don’t die — they just go back underground. Such is the story with breakbeats, the syncopated, synth-filled electro offshoot that ruled the Florida subterranean party scene until about a decade ago. (We even had our own special subgenre known as “Florida breaks.”) As the new millennium dawned, though, the old boom-boom-boom-bap seemed a little less than fresh. But a few years’ beauty sleep and some fresh blood seems to have done the breaks scene some good. The increased interest in dubstep and other low-end-favoring genres in general has helped. And in recent years, a new generation of party kids, DJs, and producers has revived old Winter Music Conference staples such as Planet of the Breaks and kept the party going throughout the rest of the year. Case in point: Friday’s Booty Breaks getdown at Mekka, a hive for the new 18-and-over electronic music crowd. The star here is Deekline, a London-based DJ/producer who always rules at the aforementioned Planet of the Breaks. Though he usually appears in tandem with musical partner Wizard, he’s no slouch when performing solo. In 1999, he was credited with inventing a breakbeat/UK garage hybrid genre called “breakstep” when he dropped the track “I Don’t Smoke,” which became a UK chart hit. So he seems particularly well positioned in 2011, a time when dubstep, UK funky, garage, dancehall, bassline, and all other forms of heavy bass are constantly mutating into one another.
Fri., July 15, 9 p.m., 2011