DJ

I knew the chair (see previous entry) inspired me to be creative again. Last night I mixed up my first DJ SuperCub mix since the beginning of the year. I need to add a few touches to the mix and then it’ll be ready for public consumption.

In the meantime, here’s one of the songs in the mix. It’s from 2008. This is Kendi with “Connected”.

This track came up on Pandora during my commute this morning and I instantly fell in love with this track. The vocalist is haunting and the track is electronic genius.

Here’s Morgan Page (with vocalist Lissie) and “Fight For You”.

Gearing up the mood for St. Valentines’ Day weekend, I thought I would share a song from my baby DJ days.

Yep, she’s sang backups with Taylor Dayne on “I’ll Be Your Shelter”; here’s “Everything Changes” by Kathy Troccoli from 1992.

When I spin at clubs I tend to play older dance music from the 70s, 80s and 90s in the early part of the evening. I have a rock solid memory when it comes to the dance music charts, especially from 1983 or so until the early 2000s and I pride myself on being able to play those tracks that fill the floor because they haven’t been heard in a long while. This is all dependent on the crowd, of course, but back in the day I always knew I was doing a good job with the early night music when Brad, a tall, stately old queen of a man would throw his hand up in the air in a very stage commanding way as he mouthed the words to the song whilst sipping his very metropolitan looking drink and chatting with his friends.

One of the things I used to enjoy doing in radio was making station exclusive edits of popular tracks and putting them into the music rotation. This was accomplished by literally splicing tape; I would use a four track, a grease pencil, a razor blade and special tape to rearrange, remove or double up the verses of select tracks. I wasn’t really interested in remixing the song to the point of non-recognition but rather I liked extending the track a little bit or doing what I could to make the song sound familiar yet different in a way.

When I put the studio back together a couple of weeks ago I came up with some ideas to freshen up some old tracks once again using the more modern methods I have available to me now. Tonight I returned to the realm of the “Cub Slice” and freshened up a dance floor staple.

For your enjoyment, from 1983 here is “Borderline (Cub Slice Re-Edit)” by Madonna.

Click on the “MP3 icon” to listen.Click on this link to listen. Right-click on this link to download.

The track is for promo use only.

When I first got started in radio the song in the video below was a very popular dance track. I have never seen the video before tonight. I never realised that the chorus is:

“Happy is, happy is, we’re happy is what we are, happy is what we are when we’re together.”

Of course, we used to play the faster dance version (127 beats per minute versus 120 BPM here).

From 1993, here’s Legacy of Sound featuring Meja with “Happy”.

So it has been a year since I last made a DJ SuperCub “Beat Assimilation” mix. The last time I spun in public was last New Year’s Eve, when a young woman drinking bathroom tap water out of a dixie cup she was sharing with her friends asked me when I was going to start playing dance music. To her, dance music meant bumping and grinding to rap on the dance floor.

I then decided that I was DJing in the wrong place. It wasn’t long afterwards that my aging mixing console decided to give up the ghost. Instead of investing the money into new equipment, I sold the aging PowerBook G4 that ran it all and settled into music obscurity.

For Christmas I was given a new mixing console along with a bunch of other sound equipment for the studio. The stars aligned and I now have Earl’s old MacBook Pro, which is working fabulously despite having been dropped five or so feet, all loaded up with my old music library.

Last night I took the new console out for a spin. And it works BEAUTIFULLY.

There will be a new “Beat Assimilation” mix by the end of the year. I have to take a few days to catch up on dance music I have missed out on, including Freemasons featuring Sophie Ellis-Bextor and “Heartbreak (Make Me A Dancer)”.

It’s time to ramp DJ SuperCub back up to full potential. Enjoy the ride.

Even though this is one of my favorite songs of the 80s (and nearly all time), before tonight I had never seen the official music video. It’s kind of cool to see music videos from back in the day when they were low budget.

I remember the first time I heard this song. I was riding in the back of my friend Scott’s Buick Century on Interstate 81 heading home from the movies in Watertown, N.Y. I remember asking him to turn up the radio because it sounded like such a good son.

The girls look a little cranky in this video but it’s fun nonetheless.

Here’s “Automatic” by The Pointer Sisters.

By the way, it’s Anita on the left, Ruth singing leads and June on the right.

While I was listening to old music today I stumbled upon one of my old favourites from the mid 1970s, England Dan and John Ford Coley’s “I’d Really Love To See You Tonight”. I still crank this song up when I get the chance.

From the release of the song in ’75(?) until 1993 or so, I thought one of the lines was “I’m not talkin’ about the linen.” I didn’t know that the line was really “I’m not talkin’ about movin’ in” until I saw my friend Storm sing the song with the radio at camp.

Looking through the comments on the YouTube video below, I’m happy to say I’m not the only one that thought that!

I have recently discovered Pandora Internet Radio on my iPhone and have fallen in love with the service. It works flawlessly on my iPhone, even on the non-3G connections. The only problem with it is that I can’t listen in Canada without building up a HUGE international data charge.

Here’s the link to Pandora if you’re not familiar with the service.

Here’s the stats on my profile just in case you’re interested in what I’m doing on there. I have also added it to the “DJ SuperCub” tab at the top of the blog.