The Round-up

I've come to think that I spend an unhealthy amount of time on the internet looking at stuff, some of it good, some great but a whole lot of it crap. So, it's a Friday afternoon, I'm at my desk with rain running down the window and I thought I could share my findings right here and someone might find it interesting - maybe?

This might become a bit irregular as posts go, but when I can I'll drop a collection of 'things' on here for readers to wander around. 

Red Bull gives you more than wings

I started my week looking for knowledge and I usually find loads of it on the Red Bull Music Academy. Their Video Archive is packed with premier interviews of all sorts of people including this mellow hour and a half with Alex Barck of Jazzanova. Fascinating stuff, hearing how East Germany has shaped his musical heritage and how Hip Hop was really the catalyst for the sound that has been one of my favourites for years. There's lots of interesting points of view of how a label can make money with so many involved and a few  tunes along the way. Also gotta say Benji B is a great interviewer - so far from the bullshit MTV generation of TV jocks - he knows his stuff!

Beatport's stops being flashy

I'm never one to be on the crest of the wave, so this might be old news to everyone by now! But, Beatport are currently Beta testing a new HTML site, and will soon be moving away from their flash based system.

From these early screen grabs things look a lot cleaner and here's hoping the menu systems and the intelligence behind it really pushes the site forward for all of us users.

Lost My Dog take on Fabric
Fabric's adventures into what I would class real music (and by that I mean away from anyone with Van in their name or David Guetta) are all too rare. And having just heard Derrick Carters CD for their long running series it's good to see a label like Lost My Dog headlining a night there (Saturday May 7th).

Here's a free download from Pete too! Click to download above. Giom and Burnski from the LMD team will also be playing on the night with Terry Francis amongst the DJ's playing in Room 2 at fabric.

Read the feature on Fabrics website here

What's with the internet?

Now you all know I like to moan about almost anything, so having decided to quite Mixcloud after a year of being on there and it not really working for me (ie. no-one listens to me on there so I'm taking my ball home if the big kids won't play nicely). Then I noticed something on the homepage that I'd seen on my beloved Soundcloud too. Let me explain...

Both sites have a 'Hot tunes' kind of section, and I'm often found checking out the 'Explore Tracks' feature on the cloud to see what new Dubstep crime against music is being played by 23,000 kids - yes there's a hint of jealousy in my tone. Both site also have one of these blocks of words for search engines that show you what's inside - and it's here that the problem is I think.

You see Mixcloud's top words are ones like Drum and Bass, Dubstep, Hip Hop and Electronica. House gets in at number 7. While over on Soundcloud House doesn't get a look in till number 15 (well right now at least). 
So, next time your tadding your tracks or mixes, be sure to class them as house, or better still deep house and let's put the record straight!

More hot air from David Guetta
According to the very respectable BBC, David Guetta, the man more often found with Ri Ri of Flo Rida, or come to mention it a whole load of other people that can't spell, has employed a former Pentagon investigator to find out who hacked into his studio computer and stole one of his productions, tweaked it a bit and released it.

Whilst I smell a load of 'hype' around the whole thing, the fact he goes on to admit to getting emails from people posing as studio engineers after the tracks by saying,

"I don't answer these emails any more but one day as I was working with Usher I had a message from his engineer - it's impossible for anyone normal to know the name of Usher's engineer. He was saying, 'Hey it's me, I need you to download those vocals.Then if you give a code they break into your computer - this kind of thing."

Begs the question has he won a million Uganda dollars recently or got a friend in Oman wanting to transfer some family money to safety just like me? 

Seriously, here's an international producer (stop giggling at the back) that appears in his own videos as... a DJ and falls for the oldest scam in the world. I'm not sure which is more tragic!

Deeper Shades Loves...

Deeper Shades of House head honcho Lars Behrenroth has kick started a new label project by bringing back an old school house classic in Deeper Shades Loves Teflon Dons. Previously tracks released only on vinyl Lars are being made available to the next generation of DJs as Lars digs through his crates.

Teflon Dons - LOVE was a one sided white label. Chants Of Lemuria was released in 1997 as a b side on the "Black Corsairs" 12" while All New Gods - was a b side track on the debut white label 12" "Planet Eater EP" alongside the tracks "Planet Eater" and "Lockjaws Lament". Released in 1995 with a pressing of 500 units.

Objects of desire

I'm a sucker for a nice bit of kit, and those top chaps over at DJTechTools have produced their own S4 Kontol Bag - of which I have absolutely no use as I don't DJ out that often and would be hard pushed to fit the S4 into most DJ booths I've had the pleasure of being in. But, what a lovely bag it is.