heck the magazine covers or summer lineups at Ibiza and minimal techno is ruling the roost. Check the lineups at summer festivals and breaks is playing second fiddle to house, techno and progressive. And let’s face it: minimal fans and house fans aren’t breaks fans and vice versa. So is breaks cooling off? You’d be forgiven for thinking so, but all hope is not lost, good breakshead. Take the upcoming South West Four Festival in London, alongside the superstar prog-heavy lineup, slots are reserved for breaks conscripts Hybrid and Stanton Warriors who are soldiering on for the good cause.

And if the battle is going to be won, it’s going to be the Stanton Warriors who line up the reservists. Unlike Hybrid, who are pursuing a darker, more polarizing sound, the Stanton Warriors are dedicated to converting dance fans of every color to the One True Path. Dom B and Mark Yardley have chopped up and syncopated tracks by the crossover likes of Gorillaz, Mylo, and The Nextmen, cutting a broad swath through genres and plucking new disciples from each one. They’re also playing the mainstream festivals. Does Dom feel that playing big gigs alongside house artists is likely to convert many clubbers to breaks?

“Over the last few years we’ve played alongside a lot of big house DJs in big house clubs. The good thing about our sound is that it can work so well with house crowds. When you here a 4/4 kick-drum all night and then a heavy break bounces in the reaction speaks for itself.”

Better to infiltrate the mainstream than confine yourself to the ghetto? While breaks festivals like Field Day play to big crowds down under, and parties like Chew the Fat pack them in in London, the genre still remains outside the mainstream as far as international recognition goes. Critics pooh-pooh it, and Fabric – a key industry oracle – has been steering its "Fabriclive" CD series away from straight-up breaks since their Scratch Perverts outing in 2005. Like the grade-school fat kid, breaks also seems woefully unpicked for these so-called “all-encompassing” electronic music festivals. But that certainly doesn’t mean breaks can’t flourish in its own right on its own nights.

“The other day in London we played alongside the Plump DJs at Fabric and there were 1,000 people locked outside,” says Dom. “Around the corner at The End nightclub it was the same story with the Chew The Fat night also playing breaks. Add to that three other underground nights elsewhere in the city and you can see just how vibrant the scene in London truly is. I would say breaks is bigger than prog house and hard dance individually. Plus, it attracts a much more knowledgeable and interesting crowd.”

And then there is the quality control issue. Sure, true-school pioneers like Adam Freeland, Rennie Pilgrem and Meat Katie continue to pull the big crowds, but are they advancing the sound enough to keep up with the hotter trends in dance? Some might say it’s now on the shoulders of breaks upstarts like the Warriors and Evil Nine to “find” breaks in other genres, welcoming a melting pot of influences. ‘Stanton Sessions Vol. 2’ delivered collaborations with rappers The Beatnuts and Big Daddy Kane, a mash-up of Roman Flügel and M.I.A as well as a massive remix of PMT’s 2000 classic ‘Gyromancer’. Does Dom feel Stanton are moving the genre forward?

"The style we are playing at the moment has been termed by some as 'minimal booty'. Imagine the sounds of minimal and electrohouse combined with a fat Miami-esque booty beat, with just a sprinkling of vocal hooks."

“The style we are playing at the moment has been termed by some as 'minimal booty'. Imagine the sounds of minimal and electrohouse combined with a fat Miami-esque booty beat, with just a sprinkling of vocal hooks. Add to that influences from Latin, tribal, Eastern, Chinese, dub and ghettotech sounds. This is what we are playing and it seems to work.”

And all is not lost. If Fabric is the bellwether, perhaps the pendulum is swinging back in breaks favor. ‘Fabriclive 30’ by the Stanton Warriors is in the can, set for release in October 2006. And it looks like it’s going push the genre forward. How did Dom choose the tracks for the mix?

“When we started out on the Fabric comp we were very disillusioned with what was available out there in the breaks scene. So we set out to make some fresh tracks alongside cherry-picking the classiest house and electro tracks we could find in order to do exclusive edits. Technically it’s breaks, but to us it’s just subtle booty-shaking grooves which people of any dance musical persuasion can get with.”

The Fabriclive CD won’t hurt their cred outside the breaks genre, but despite Warriors cuts being a mainstay in any self-respecting breaks DJ’s crate, Dom and Mark remain on the fringe of Plump DJs-like fame. Inside the breaks scene too, where it counts, they haven’t quite made it to the top: for instance they’ve yet to score a Breakspoll win in five years, despite the success of their compilations and singles. Does that rankle Dom?

“I think Breakspoll is a positive thing, but we have always shied away from 'vote for me' campaigns. Maybe there should be an award for actual records sold – that would be interesting. Our Sway track 'Get Em High' looks like it could do big things with the right support. It would be nice to get another Top 20 hit like we had with our Busta Rhymes combo [“Can U Feel It”] back in 2002.”

Ah, the lure of the mainstream. What are the battle tactics on that front?

“Producing more artist-led tunes with rappers and singers. We were one of the first production crews to put breaks and hip-hop together and it’s something that can help take breaks to a wider audience. We will still do remixes, but only of tracks that we find special. It gives us much-needed ammunition in our DJ sets.”

So what’s next for the Stanton Warriors? They’ve recently wrapped up tracks with Sway and Dynamite MC as well as some hookups with top-secret vocalists and rappers, the names of which they are “keeping under wraps at the moment.” Any other secret missions?

“We’ve got a brand-new artist album set for release early 2007. Then there’s the Stanton Sessions regular nights in London, Miami, Dubai and Shanghai as well as some more interesting remixes and more artist-led productions. Can’t wait.”

Neither can we. With a new album and an international assault planned, the Stanton Warriors could be set to blow up in the coming months. Cynics would be forgiven for thinking Dom’s dreams of “another Top 20 hit” and a Breakspoll Award for “actual records sold” have “sellout” written all over them, but the Warriors seem to have their heads on straight. And look out magazine covers and summer festivals, if they succeed in their mission, here’s to 2007 being the Year of the Breaks.