A number of pop/rock songs have a spot toward the end where the accompanying instruments fall away and all that’s left is the singer’s voice and (often) clapping. The other instrumentation then comes back in, sometimes gradually, during repeats of the chorus. Does this have a name?
Sounds like a false ending.
Nah, it’s not really an ending, because the singer is still singing. If you’re looking for a musical name for it, it sounds like an a capella segment to me.
repeating something over and over until further notice is a “vamp”.
Not a false ending, if “false ending” means what it sounds like it means.
Two songs that come to my mind that have this are Dobie Gray’s “Drift Away” and Bob Seger’s “Old Time Rock and Roll.” Both of them drop out all instrumentation except percussion while the vocals continue through the chorus once. Then the other instruments come back in and the chorus repeats.
the break?
My wife, with two degrees in music, says that there isn’t an official name for this device. I don’t know who did it first, but everybody else has copied it because they heard it on somebody’s record. And because it’s kinda cool.
If it were live and the song wasn’t usually like that, I’d call it the ‘audience participation’ segment. Otherwise, I doubt there’s a proper term for it.
A capella usually denotes there’d be some vocal harmonies, not just the singer and a bass drum. An example of a capella would be the bridge in Weezer’s ‘Holiday.’
Another example is Blinded by the Light, by Manfred Mann’s Earth Band. After an extended guitar solo that takes up the middle third of the song, all the instruments fall out except for Manfred, an organ, and the beat being tapped on a cymbal, as he sings, “Mama always told me not to look into the eyes of the sun / But Mama, that’s where the fun is.” At which point a vigorous cello enters, followed by a piano playing Chopsticks, then wordless backup vocals, and finally Manfred resumes singing the verses.
Then less than a minute later, we’re back to just Manfred, accompanied by the electric organ, repeating the chorus, “Blinded by the light / Wrecked up like a douce, another runner in the night…” when another track of his voice enters singing the verse in apposition, and all the band returns with him.
[nitpick] deuce, not douce [/nitpick] 
Makes me think of Sly and the Family Stone’s Dance to the Music…
*All we need is a drummer,
for people who only need a beat
I’m gonna add a little guitar
and make it easy to move your feet
I’m gonna add some bottom,
so that the dancers just won’t hide
You might like to hear my organ
playing “Ride Sally Ride”
- (etc etc)… at each point a new instrument comes in.
I agree with bookbuster, when I’m playing with folks, generally people call it the ‘break’. It doesn’t happen to be in my Harvard Dictionary of Music, but any rock musician will know what you mean if you call it that.
Oh, and another nitpick for Walloon (just because as a Springsteen fan I can’t let this one go), Blinded by the Light was written by Bruce Springsteen, and covered by Manfred Mann.
Actually, you’re both wrong. Everybody knows it’s “Wrapped up like a douche, another runner in the night…”
Marry me. 
I never claimed Manfred Mann wrote it. :rolleyes:
Yeah, another nitpick (sorry) - Manfred Mann is the name of the band, not the singer.
Manfred Mann is the stage name of Manfred Lubowitz, the group’s founder and keyboardist.
It’s actually “Revved up like a deuce”.
I’ve got two degrees in music and agree with your wife …in seriousness, the Beach Boy’s Pet Sounds is a good place to start, should you want to work out where these things originate.