Area 709

Well, this has been a long time coming.

In October, I took a look back through my "music" section and noticed that my output for 2009 had been, well, disappointingly sparse.  Hopefully, “Archives” makes up for a series of smaller, less involved mixes I didn't have the energy to record last year.   

"Archives" is the result of a lot of experimentation in various live settings over the last year.  While I've been happy to pound out somewhat aggressive peaktime techno for the last two of Soundproof parties, this mix represents my softer and slightly more introspective better half.  It's an accurate representation of the kind of music you would expect to hear from me in the late morning at a Soundproof or Beheshto event, or at an after party. 

Despite having 30 tracks, the mix clocks in an an hour and 20 minutes.  A lot of the time, you're hearing 3 or 4 sources of audio, looped and spliced together, so I tried noting this as accurately as possible in the track listing.  Like other mixes, it was recorded in one go, and there are a couple of little mistakes here and there.   

It's taken me a while to wrap my head around this style of DJing, and it definitely lends itself - for me personally - more to a morning mood.  My first attempt playing out live with this system nearly became a massive train wreck.  Keeping track of and managing to play and arrange the right elements of four tracks was a bit of an overwhelming experience.

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"Archives" Track Listing

1. “Stargirl” - Mike Monday / “10101” - James Holden / “Going, Going, Gone” - MyMy

2. “Acid Burn” - Billy Dalessandro (Gui Boratto rmx) 

3. “Eucalipt” - Mihai Popoviciu, Jay Bliss, Pagal / “Soul C.A. Jones” - Alex Flatner (Mihai Popoviciu rmx)

4. “Blue Sheers” - Minima, Alex Sander (Inaqui Marin rmx) / “Amenity” - Link

5. “The Silent Bass” - Heiko Laux

6. “Reach ft. Jody Watley” - Max Sanna (Mark Broom rmx) / “Hooked” - Tiger Stripes

7. “Ghost Song” - Slam (Joris Voorn rmx)

8. “It’s Too Late” - Rocha & Lewinger (Loko rmx) / “Jamaica” - Minilogue (Dubfire rmx)

9. “Metroman” - Asem Shama / “Beyond Detroit” - Sahar Z, Audio Junkies

10. “Revelation” - Joris Voorn

11. “Two Dots” - Lusine, ft. Vilja Larjosto / “Ghettotech” - Leama, James Davis, Grafiti (D-Dub rmx)

12. “Gentle” - Lovebirds (Ian Pooley rmx)

13. “Time For Grace” - District One

14. “Beneath” - Edit Select (Mark Broom rmx) / “Lila” - Rodriguez Jr.

15. “Last Train to Nagano” - Nagano Kitchen (Joris Voorn rmx) / “Shuttle 070” - Tim J, Mike Scolari

16. “Last Train to Brooklyn” - Loco Dice / “Black Rose” - Solomun (Trickski rmx)

17. “Faces” - Pan-Pot (Vincenzo rmx)/ “Llovizna” - Francisco Allendes, Felipe Venegas / “Beach Kisses” - Dosem (rework) 

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For the music nerds, the mix was created with the same piece of software I've been using to play out at almost every event in 2009 - Native Instruments' Trakor Pro.  The software's four virtual decks and effects are controlled by two midi controllers - a Nocturn and Remote Zero SL - produced by Novation.  Sound was processed through a Focusrite, Saffire LE sound card.  Yes, I use a Mac.  For those of you who were there, this is the same setup I used at Trancemission 12 in July.  

While I like this system quite a bit, I’ve gone back to turntables - using Traktor's vinyl emulation - for all the parties I’ve played since August.  Yeah, turntables... remember those?  This might seem like a bit of step backwards for someone who’s fully embraced laptop DJing, but, it seems to work well for me.  As for Traktor itself, the program is stable, sounds good and like the turntables, suits me just fine.