Juice – Catch A Groove 1976

The track “Catch A Groove” released by the band Juice in 1976 is a lovely song to me

Bassline, horn section and a magnificent drumbreak in the middle of the song make it a banger that I love to play when the opportunity arises. In the song there are at least three parts that are sampled by many. The first is a trumpet melody directy followed by a second sample, the drumbreak. A few seconds later the drumbreak gets a 2nd bar with congo’s added. That is sample number three. Arguably there is another sample in between the drumbreaks with a guitar stroke. Together they are sampled in more than 220 tracks. Possibly more, the source whosampled.com is rather complete but there can always be information missing.

Juice – Catch A Groove Break 12 inch version (3 seconds before start fragments)

My idea was to buy the track on vinyl for multiple reasons. To play when I am DJ-ing with vinyl singles and to discuss when I am talking about samples on my website and my Doc OK livestreams.

Let’s go to work

The song is not released in Europe, it is almost impossble to find the single in a Dutch secondhand shop. That is why I bought the original single [Greedy Records Ltd. – G-108 / 1976] on Discogs.

Bought at a Dutch trader, that must be said. After a few days the single comes in. After a clean on my Okki Nokki it goes directly to the record player. The quality is good, you can hear some surface noise but ok, the single is from 1976. I hear the break approaching where the two samples follow each other directly. This is going to be fine.

Juice – Catch A Groove No Break single version (3 seconds before start fragment)

The moment when the break should enter the music continous, so no break. Ai! It is a shorter version of the song. What a disappointment, I did not know this. The producer of the single probably thought that the song would also be alright without a break and made the length shorter to 2 minute and 46 seconds. The complete version is a normal single length: 3 minute 34 seconds, the reason of the shorter version is not clear to me.

Now the collecting rage comes up

“Shift immediately and buy the 12 inch” is my first thought. Because when you are so close you think somehat less rational. A repress of the maxisingle was for sale from a befriended seller. I picked it up quickly in Amsterdam. That way I could check some more material from the man. You never know if you come across some more nice material, the so called by-catch.

The maxisingle [Greedy Records Ltd. (2) – DGD 108 / 2005] did scare me for a bit because the labels on the record are ‘flipped’.

Where side-A is indicated it is in reality side B. The B-side continues the hit from side-A (do you still follow me) and that part does not contain the break. Luckily I found out fast that “Catch A Groove” was indeed on the record. Including the break. Got it!

Moreover not much later I bought a 7 inch single  [Breaks & Beats – BAB 003 / 2017].

A special edit dated from 2017 from the Beats & Breaks serie. Length of the track is 4 minute and 1 second. This is a version that starts with the drumbreak, so it does not sound like the real version. I bought it for use at occasions when I play 7 inch singles.