Futurists

a while back I posted a link to some old skool house mixes from the late 80s. These were pretty good, but in reality they were a bit too soulful even for me – I’m not as into the vocal, soulful, almost gospel style of house music from those days – I personally prefer the more hardcore acid house that also surfaced during that time.

naturally I started looking around the web for some good mixes, and by searching for “acid house podcasts” I managed to find the page of DJ JuJu, a British DJ from South London (now living in Norfolk).

I’ve never heard of him myself, but this fellow has a pretty good grasp of the acid. His site has a series of free downloads of mixes ranging from acid to vocal to hip house, and I’ve linked to them below.

Classic House Part 1: Vocal house and garage from ‘88 to ‘90. Some big tunes in here (like Tribal House’s Motherland and Sweat by Jay Williams at the end of the mix), though as I have mentioned I wasn’t as big into the vocal house as I was the other stuff.

Classic House Part 2: More classic vocal house. Listen for Chanelle’s One Man and the Steve Hurley mix of Ten City’s That’s the Way Love Is.

Classic House Part 3: Deep classic house from ‘88 to ‘90. The instrumental version of ESP’s It’s You is one of my favorite house tracks of all time (and so much better than the vocal version), and Can U Dance by Kenny ‘Jammin’ Jason & Fast Eddie is guaranteed to bring it back.

Classic House Part 4: An awesome mix of acid house and Detroit techno, some of my favorite genres. Reese & Santonio’s The Sound is a true classic, (love that 808 drum line), plus there’s Ride the Rhythm’s This Ain’t Chicago for a killer acid line and the jammin’ Work It to the Bone by LNR.

Classic House Part 6 (there is no part 5): Some hip house classics. Yet another of my favorite genres of classic music! I recommend you skip the first part of the mix and start at minute 25:00. From there you’ve got the 1997 remake of Doug Lazy’s Let It Roll called Rollin’ On, the club mix of Mr. Lee’s Get Busy, Musto & Bones’ Dangerous on the Dance Floor, I’ll House You by the Jungle Brothers, Fast Eddie’s Yo Yo Get Funky and the white label Planet E. Seriously, this stuff is tremendous. If you don’t like this stuff you may in fact have no soul.

and this next mix isn’t a classic house mix, but…

JuJu 4 Hour Radio Show 19th April 2009: A mix of classic techno and rave music, for the most part. This is a massive four hour mix, containing three of my favorite classic techno tracks, Tronik House’s Up Tempo and Altern8’s Infiltrate 202 followed by Comin’ On Strong by Rhythm Section. If you want to listen to what I think is the sweet spot of this mix, start at about 2:25:00.

DJ JuJu has plenty of other mixes on his site (the last one uploaded on February 18th, 2010) so I recommend you visit his site and check it out! I’ll be heading back there on occasion to see if he’s put out any more compilations of some of my favorite classic tracks.

so while I consider myself technically adept, and above average when it comes to adopting and adapting new communications technologies to suit my evil purposes, I somehow missed the boat on podcasts. That may be partially because I’m not huge into the way that iTunes tries to take control of your computer every time you install or upgrade it, and therefore I don’t use it very often. However it happened, I only jumped on the podcasting bandwagon the other day, but I’ll admit I’ve become a fan.

there are tons of excellent DJ mixes out there, mixed by a whole bunch of different DJs and producers, that will simply appear for you, fresh out of the oven so to speak, as soon as they’ve been uploaded by their creators! Those of you already into podcasts are probably pointing and laughing at the screen (well, at the guy behind the screen) and saying “well duh, of course”, but to me, this is pretty big news.

so to celebrate my late discovery of this fantastic technology, here is a podcasted mix by Steve Helstrip, aka The Thrillseekers, a producer who I mentioned a few posts back. I’m linking this mix because I’m really loving the Nitrous Oxide and Adam Nickey song Moon Dust. I even burned a CD of this mix so that I could listen to it in my ancient car.

in other news, as soon as I finish this post I’m going to work on my latest song. It’s been a long time in the coming, but it’s almost done! And I’ll post it on this site when it is.

a few years back I used to listen to the Global Soundwave mixes with DJ James Williams, a DJ based out of San Francisco. He played a variety of popular trance music. The only minor complaint I had about his DJing that I did bring up to him over email is that he tended to talk quite a bit throughout his mix – introducing himself, greeting people in the chatroom, and that sort of thing. It’s not really that big a deal, but it’s one of my pet peeves to hear people talking during a DJ mix – I’m there for the music, not for the banter.

at any rate, I hadn’t heard from him for a while, so the other day I checked his web site and discovered several mixes he’d created ready for free download (right click on them to snag them) – and better still, the mixes are completely banter-free, just the way I like them! From what I’ve heard so far they are more melodic and less hardcore than some trance mixes – very easy to listen to.

the only downside here is that James Williams appears to have stopped making mixes – the last mix on the site was put there in November of 2008. I don’t know what he’s been up to lately, but I do hope he’ll eventually get back to work putting some more mixes onto his site.

why are you not listening to this Daft Punk live set right now?

I’ve had it on repeat pretty much since I found it. A tremendous mix featuring plenty of classic Daft Punk songs and more use of low-pass filters than you can shake a stick at.

I lived in Ireland for a while, working at a large bank in Dublin. It took me about an hour to walk to work every day, and an hour to walk back afterwards (for those who know the city, I lived in Terenure, Dublin 6W, while working in Ballsbridge and Donnybrook, Dublin 4). The results of this were twofold; one, I got into pretty good shape walking a good two hours every day (in a suit no less), and two, I listened to a heck of a lot of different music during my walks.

of all the mixes I listened to during that time, perhaps the most memorable were two dancehall mixes spun by an Irish DJ called Droid, of Droid + Slug, a pair of DJs normally known for spinning old skool, jungle, dubstep, etc. I think these dancehall mixes may have been a bit out of the ordinary for this pair.

I’d already been into dancehall to some extent, having previously attended several Dub Island Soundsystem jams here in Charleston, SC. Droid’s mixes took this to a new level, however, if only due to the sheer amount of time I spent walking around Dublin while listening to them.

the mixes are called Droid Inna Dancehall Volume 1 – Basement Bashment and Droid Inna Dancehall Volume 2 – Alternate Roots (free downloads of zip files of the music can be found down the page, as well as track listings and explanations of what Droid was up to).

perhaps the most interesting thing about the first mix is that it leads off with a track by µ-Ziq (heavy electronica) and mixes with a bagpipe riddim (dancehall). The mix is strictly dancehall after that. In Droid’s own words it doesn’t quite work, but it certainly does add interest to the mix, and I doubt such a pairing of these widely different genres has been attempted before.

a few posts back I mentioned my old friend Brian Neckel from Detroit (now living in Louisville), with whom I occasionally collaborate on some music (I’m still waiting for that up-tempo Bobbins Remix by the way). I thought now might be a good time to offer up a link to one of his mixes!

so here it is, a minimal techno mix called MNML 502. You’ll note there is a free download link on the page, so snag it and stick it in your rotation!

lately I’ve been jamming to some excellent old school house mixes, mixed by DJ Scott Miller, on the Classic House Mixes podcast site. As the site promises, they feature “over 25 deep, soulful, vocal, gospel, classic to fresh quality house music mixes and podcasts”. This is all fine and good, but what it amounts to to me is a journey back to the year 1989, when house music was huge in Chicago and, among other places, Toronto (where I grew up).

I think the mixes are pretty good, though truthfully I was never (and am still not) as into “soulful, vocal house” as I was into the more dance-ready, club-oriented tunes generated by such producers as Steve “Silk” Hurley, Todd Terry Project, Royal House, and so on. Nonetheless, these mixes are definitely worth a listen, and will bring back some excellent memories, if you have them, of one of my favorite eras of music.

P.S. Because I get a lot of searches for this quote, I thought I’d mention here that “What we’re gonna do right here is go back” was featured in the 1988 house music hit Weekend by the Todd Terry Project. The original sample, however, comes from the 1972 song Troglodyte (Cave Man) by the Jimmy Castor Bunch.

P.P.S. For more classic, vocal, acid and hip house, check out this more recent post.

one place I make sure to visit from time to time is New Mixes, a site hosting a variety of DJ mixes of different electronic genres.  Lately they’ve been having some difficulties keeping links to their mixes active (as of this writing, only the most recent of mixes are downloadable – but they’re great).  I’ve had the Nature One 2009 mixes on repeat at work since they arrived on the site last August.  At any rate, highly recommended.

I’ve been studying for a certification lately, so I haven’t been getting at the music, but I’ve still been listening to it. Right now I’m listening to an excellent mix by Pinky Chukkles called Ruminations. This mix takes me back in time to what I feel was an awesome era in dance music – the mid-90s – and features several of my favorite bands from that era, including The Drum Club, The Orb, and The Irresistible Force. How can anyone not like “Fish Dances”?

I must admit I’ve listened to this mix many many times. I find it to be a great airport journey mix… the kind you can listen to while camped out in a terminal with your laptop with a big cup of coffee steaming on the table beside you.