Track of the last couple weeks? 5:31 PM

Yeah, it's been a bit, I've been working a ton lately, but this track is a new favorite and it's a BANGER!

The original comes off MSTRKRFT's latest album "Fist of God", and although the original tracks off the album haven't had amazing response , a few remixes have come out and been well received. One of these is by blog superstar Bird Peterson, who just recently played here in LA at the west coast mega-festival known as the Electric Daisy Carnival amongst a packed electro lineup.

His remix of the single "It Ain't Love" is a major floor banger, but Jessie F Keeler or "JFK" decided that an already impressive remix wasn't enough, and thus we are left with this:

MSTRKRFT - It Ain't Love (Bird Peterson remix / JFK edit)

A bit stale lately... 8:45 PM

Sorry for lack of updates. Finally got back to getting some steady hours at work and that has taken away from blogging time. I've barely even had time to get on the decks this week, but today was my "friday" for the week so I now have two days to kick back and relax (and maybe go jam to some beats).

In other news...

San Diego seems to be blowing up in the indie electro department. Successful nights such as Feel The Noise, Boombox Thursdays and Boys and Girls have been running now for a while, but lately a couple of new nights have popped up and look very promising.

"Voyeur", a relatively new club downtown, is now offering electro bangers 3 nights a week thursday through saturday. A quick glance at their website reveals upcoming nights featuring the likes of Nadastrom, A-Trak, and Designer Drugs. With cover purported to be light and this class of headliners, this may become a hot commidity in an already blossoming SD electro scene.

Spin Nightclub has already been hosting big names in EDM at it's weekly friday engagement in collaboration with Giant, but it's added a second night on Saturday and has been bringing some pretty big talent already. Forthcoming they have LA Riots, AC Slater (!!!), Felix Cartal, and D.I.M. coming through to rock what is quite possibly the best sound system in San Diego.

While LA still holds the overall edge in quality EDM events, SD seems to have carved itself a nice little niche as a hot spot in the general electro scene, and that only means bigger names and bigger parties coming to town in the future.

(MSTRKRFT, Jack Beats, and Foamo plz kthxbye)

Scream 6/12/09 in San Diego 11:51 AM

So Scream went down last night at the historic World Beat Center. Overall the party looked to be a good success for the promoters, lots and lots of kids showed up, more than I've probably ever seen at a san diego underground event.

The WBC is an awesome venue, it was perfect size for the crowd, and although it was a bit stuffy and warm inside, overall it was tolerable. Sound could have been a bit better, but we can only ask for so much.

True Psuedo, who's done pretty well on the blogs over the past year or so, was actually somewhat of a disappointment for me. I was all jazzed to hear their original work, but instead I got a beatport top 10 chart from the last year of electro house. They had a few good tracks, but I can only hear "The Reward is Cheese" and "Easy Love" so many times live before it gets moved to the "rinsed" category.

I'll try to get some pics up here momentarily once they start showing up on the photo-wire.

Track of the Day - June 11, 2009 7:48 AM

Dubstep is really starting to make headway in the EDM world as a rapidly growing genre of it's own and not just a younger, weirder brother of Drum and Bass. While it started out dark and grimey, some producers are starting to bring new light to the sub wobble. I've been listening to this track on and off for a few days now, and it's got a great summer chillout vibe, but still has the dubby flavor.

Silkie and Harry Craze - French Knickers (DOWNLOAD)

Ableton and the APC40 1:54 PM

So as most people on the cutting edge of digital DJ technology know, Ableton is making a strong headway as a real platform for hybrid DJ/live performances and even fully live performances. The smart folks at Akai Professional, who have been putting out an already great selection of midi controllers for producers, caught wind of this and months later put out this sexy piece of midi heaven:

Say hello to the Akai APC40, Akai's dedicated ableton live controller.

This thing is really an entirely new concept in midi controllers, other than a few rare controllers that are almost impossible to find. For some reason or another, no one has really released a controller with (for lack of a better description), this much going on in one unit. The possibilities are pretty endless.

In this post, I'm offering up my own thoughts on Ableton and "Live" DJ performances in general.

Ableton Live is one pretty nifty piece of software. Live was designed to be both an interface for live performance allowing musicians the ability to play a virtual rack of "instruments" via midi, but also work as a recorder/sequencer/DAW. It can also be used as an add-on effects unit by routing your audio signal through it and using it's extensive effects ability. There is a lot of great audio software out there for various purposes, but it's arguable that almost nothing packs the combined power that Live does in one application.

Live as a DJ platform is something that's somewhat new, but already big heavyweights such as Deadmau5 and trance veteran Paul Van Dyk have embraced this new platform and are using it in front of big crowds all over the world. Ableton already has many DJ functions built into it, but of course using Live to simply swap EQs and faders would be a horrid waste of such a powerful software. Instead, the ability to trigger samples/loops, 100s of effects, and adding live instrumentation make Live unique from any other "DJ" software out there. Can you say live remixing, live mashups, and true live electronic music?

I've had a chance to play around with Live, and in my opinion, it definitely does live up to the hype put around it. The interface looks a bit daunting at first but Live includes some great easy to follow tutorials that can get you up and making/performing music pretty quickly. I'm no big producer, but I've toyed with Reason/Cubase/FL Studio and Live ranks pretty high in the easy to use category, at least for me. I've never found any DAW software "easy" to pick up, and it's a somewhat skewed discussion as Live has tutorials built in to it, but once you understand recording midi notes, the rest comes pretty darn easy.

Live as a DJ tool is something that I've contemplated myself for sometime, but DJing with Live really takes a whole different mindset and thought process towards your music and how you structure and play your set, although traditional sounding DJ sets are certainly still possible with Live.

For myself, if I'm considering a new technology/hardware/software, I want something that will bring something new to my mixes. It makes no sense to drop a chunk of cash into something that simply does the same thing as what you had before. Now the creative possibilities with Live are certainly through the roof, but I don't know if the possibilities are possible with all genres, and that's where I run into a roadblock.

With a structured, layered genre like Tech House or Minimal Techno, one can take a base track, and add a plethora of samples, loops, and sounds without clashing too much with the original track. With big, driving electro/house/techno tracks that have lots going on in them, being able to layer even MORE sounds over that is a tough task and almost starts to take away from the original track (my opinion). Now that doesn't mean I haven't shut the door completely on Live...

Where I could see myself going with Live (and this is something I'd love to see more DJs/musicians take on), is deconstructing tracks down to simple elements, and then rebuilding a track through the layering of track elements. This is where the live remixing can flourish, in my mind at least. Imagine the main lead synth of Deadmau5' "The Reward is Cheese", layed over a wobbly dubstep bassline - pretty cool idea, huh? (PS: don't steal that) Or imagine a popular house track reconstructed over a pounding techno beat...the possibilities are great here.

Now, that's all fine and dandy, but the above means either making hundreds of samples or recording hundreds of your own sounds to fill an hour long set and still make it diverse and interesting, and that's the dividing line for me. As a DJ, I work with pre-built tracks and (attempt to) structure and mix them in a way to entertain a crowd. Sure I could do the same thing with 100s of sounds and samples, but I just don't have the time and honestly the motivation to dive into a DAW and crank out a ton of kicks, leads, hats, snares, and basslines (for now).

This is not a diss against Live in any way, I fully believe in the power of it and commend those that look to further it's vast abilities as a DJ platform, but for now, it's not for me.

Track of the Day - June 8, 2009 3:54 PM

Yeah so I skipped a few days...

This original track has been covered/remixed/rinsed to death, and I was happy with the LA Riots remix for a while, but this one caught me by surprise and has turned into a personal favorite of mine. LAZRTag's first remix of this track was a bit dim for my tastes, but now he has come back with his new "Harder remix" which has been in rotation in my playlists for a while now. So, on to the business:

Crystal Castles vs. Health - Crimewave (LAZRtag Harder remix)

Arielle and Alyssa 5:36 PM

Quit being fatties with Emily.

Thanks.