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Breach on underground track ‘Jack’ going viral: “when a record goes that big people say you've sold out”

British DJ and record producer Ben Westbeech, aka Breach, reflects on the making of his biggest record, Jack, which has been re-released by Defected Records nine years after its initial release. He reveals how a B-side written for the underground scene became his biggest hit…

It may be nearing the end of December, but Ben Westbeech has just been for a morning swim in the sea. Hailing from Hertfordshire via stints in Bristol, London and Amsterdam, he isn’t braving the English Channel though, but the Mediterranean Sea of his now home in Ibiza.

“I moved here for nature, really,” he says. “I've lived in cities all my life, so I was a bit sick of living in a place where you're on top of everyone or there's lots of people around. I wanted to get to a place where there's lots of lovely nature, and I love the sea, so I wanted to be close to that. 

"I have a cold swimming club – we’re called the Santa Eulalia otters,” he laughs. “We swim every day. It's nice – it's kind of a community.”

Given his house, drum and bass and dance credentials, many will be surprised to learn that Westbeech is a classically trained cellist, pianist and vocalist.

“I didn't really fit into that classical world,” he admits. 

“I've always felt a bit odd being in there. I never thought about pursuing a career in classical music, although my old singing teacher did say she wanted me to be an opera singer. But I don't think that lifestyle is for me. 

"I got into dance music around age 11 and started DJing at that time. I kind of had to unlearn almost all of the musicality I had learned and work out how to make music without all of that going on as well.”

Tunes sometimes come back for a period and then disappear again, that's just how music works.

He’s got no regrets when it comes to not following the classical path, quickly finding a home in the dance world. 

His debut album Welcome to the Best Years of Your Life was released in 2007, and now, four albums later and numerous collabs in between (including writing the vocal for Redlight's breakthrough hit Get Out My Head), his biggest hit yet, 2013’s Jack, has just been re-released by Defected Records, nine years after climbing to no. 9 on the UK singles chart under his moniker, Breach.

“Basically the rights came up,” he laughs by way of explaining the timing of the re-release. 

“You sign record deals for a certain period of time. After this period Defected got in touch and they were like, ‘We really want to re-license this and give it a new breath of life; we think it's time’. We’ve got Derrick Carter to do a remix – he’s a Chicago house legend – and then a couple of other people are remixing it. It's about getting it back out into the clubs. 

"Tunes sometimes come back for a period and then disappear again, that's just how music works. We'll see what happens to it…I have no idea how it's gonna go. You’ve just got to hope and pray!”

There was a lot of animosity if you had a big record and you were from the underground.

Jack remains one of the standout records from a time often coined deep house’s golden era, although Westbeech shares that it was never intended to be a single, let alone one he foresaw the mainstream industry paying any attention to. 

Dirtybird boss Claude VonStroke signed his track Let’s Get Hot and requested something “with a sleazier vibe” as a B-side.

“I ended up writing two tunes and Jack was one of them,” he recalls. “Claude VonStroke was like, ‘It's great, but I think it's the B-side’. So I was like, ‘Okay, cool. No problem’, then everyone started playing it and it was spreading like wildfire. Everyone was playing it. 

"You notice the vocal straightaway because there wasn't really a huge amount that sounded like that at the time. After a while, we saw the reaction it was having and the decision was made to make this an A-side, so then it got released.”

The song did so well it caught Atlantic’s attention, which promptly threw a massive budget behind it – resulting in an oddball wig-centric music video which racked up over 14 million views. 

“Then it went even bigger, but it was funny because when a record goes that big then you get people saying, ‘Oh, you've sold out’ – because it's just an underground record,” he reflects. 

“Underground music’s always been funny like that. People get really into it and they'll stay in one scene forever and be diehard with that, and I totally respect that to be honest, but I'm someone who needs more than just one style of music in my life, or one sort of sound. I've never been against any sort of commercial music or success. 

"I think music’s just music and everything's got its own little place in the world musically. But in those days, there was a lot of animosity if you had a big record and you were from the underground. People would be like, ‘You can't play the underground clubs anymore because you made a big record’. It's strange how dance music works like that,” he shrugs.

I made it sound a bit more womanly, and then processed the crap out of it!

Westbeech thinks that the track’s longevity stems from the very fact that he wrote it not to appeal to the mainstream, and without any obvious singalong parts or melodic hooks. 

“There's a naivety if you're making records like that; it kind of comes from the heart,” he considers. “That's the essence of what you really want when you're making music. When you're writing to be commercial and to be a ‘radio record’, you're going to conform in some way to things that maybe aren't you. My advice is always, don't do that. It's not particularly what I'm about or what I want to do with my music. But if it happens, it's great.”

The track’s lyrics consist of the repeated spoken phrase: “I want your body, everybody wants your body, so let's jack.” These, says Westbeech, came to him in a dream.

“I woke up and I put a voice note in my phone of the lyrics, then went back to sleep and woke up the next day and listened to it,” he remembers. “I thought, ‘I've got to go to the studio and put that down’, so I went and put it down, and then a few days later came back to it and made the record in one day.”

The ginger wig-clad woman in the music video isn’t the one behind the American, feminine-sounding lyrics – it turns out, it’s all Westbeech: “I wanted it to sound like a woman saying it,” he nods. 

“So I did it in a different range of my voice and made it sound a bit more womanly, and then processed the crap out of it. Then it was lots of pitching down and pitching up and resampling it. I think I resampled it about 20 times or something like that. I didn't really think too much about it; I was just in the zone with it.”

I've tried mixing in some other DAWs but I always come back to Cubase.

In terms of the production, it’s a stripped back track, which Westbeech says was intentional:

“The idea came together really quickly and I spent about two weeks mixing it. It is stripped back, but it was made to sound like that. 

"Everything has its own special place – the bassline is obviously huge and the kick is huge, so getting those to work together was a tough one. It did take a long time to get the mix right on it to sound as fat as it does.”

In his studio, Westbeech has been using Steinberg’s Cubase as his DAW for at least 20 years. He’s using the most recent iteration, Cubase 12, which includes improved MIDI remote integration, editing tools, enhanced audio-to-MIDI and new effects. 

“It was the first programme I got introduced to and I just never stopped using it,” he explains. “I've tried mixing in some other DAWs but I always come back to Cubase because I just get it, you know? I'm quick with it and I like the workflow for mixing. I like the sounds you can get out of it.”

His personal favourite aspects of Cubase are its pitch and time correction features for moving audio around: 

“It's phenomenal. I love how you can group a whole bunch of tracks together and move them up and down. The other main thing I love is the sound you can get out of it. It's a great DAW and the sound engine really works for me. I always go back to Cubase because I know how to get my sound out of it. 

"I must say my best feature about Cubase 12 is them getting rid of the dongle,” he shares. “The amount of things I lost over the years…if you lose it, you couldn't use it again. So I'd always be calling up Steinberg like, ‘I've lost a dongle again’,” he laughs, shaking his head.

I didn't really fit into that classical world. I've always felt a bit odd being in there.

In addition to the Jack re-release, Westbeech has a number of remixes lined up for 2023, as well as a folk album which he’s currently putting the finishing touches to.

“I'm always working, making new things and trying to learn every day and push myself. I’m just trying to keep enjoying it,” he says, sharing that there are two things he must have on Christmas day in Ibiza: a sea swim and bread sauce. 

“The Santa Eulalia otters go down to the beach and we have oysters and prosecco and a Christmas swim. All our friends and family are here, so that's what we do on Christmas Day, and then obviously a nice big dinner. 

"I love Christmas. I'm really into food and drinking nice wine. I'm a massive fan of bread sauce as well – which I know splits opinion, but I'm a massive lover of it. I make a massive batch of that on Christmas Day. It's changed my life, bread sauce,” he grins.