ｃｌａｓｓｉｃｓ l l l

Explicit content warning

11/13/23 • 34 min

For a long time, I’ve wanted to give flowers to some of the great pop tapes and CDs I grew up with.
It's time for my little love letter to INXS's 'Shabooh Shoobah.' INXS's Kick dropped when I was in the 7th grade, and it was everywhere. As a budding crate digger, I randomly bought this one with my lawn mowing money and was obsessed. For much of 1988, I rotated between 'Shabooh Shoobah', The Cars' self-titled album, and the Doors' 'Absolutely Live,' in my RadioShack-brand Walkman. In fact, I could get through all of 'Shabooh Shoobah' and half of the 'Cars' tape on my morning bus ride to school. Good times.
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Previous Episode

Akron Square Nightclub 02.29.2016

I found this buried on my hard drive. This is my open-to-close set at Akron’s Square Nightclub in Highland Square on February 19th, 2016. This was a fun gig I held down for a few years after it fell into my lap. I used to play deep cuts and hipster stuff for the heck of it at Square and set up the main DJs who were in regular rotation. They used to, sorta, start later and later since someone was already there (me) who set up the booth and made sure the subs were bumping and not overheating since I’d aim fans at them and stuff, like the true gear nerd that I am.
One day, DJ Robin, originally scheduled to take over at 11 PM, couldn’t make it, and I ended up filling in. In no time, I settled into a weekly routine of subbing for either Robin or the other main DJ (whose name escapes me even after all these years).
Even though Square is known as an LGBT bar, it also serves as the only dance floor in Highland Square. As the night progresses, the crowd changes from older gay patrons to bridesmaids, then to 30-year-olds looking to have a good time before heading home to relieve their babysitters. Eventually, from 1-2:30 AM, it transforms into a full-on college bar.
The DJs had already established a “pay-to-play” tradition, with a request list placed next to the tip jar. I heavily relied on that list to figure out wtf these people wanted to hear, and would cop things from iTunes as needed. For this gig I’d basically play a request then riff for a few songs, and then grab another request, all night long. I built up a pretty solid charts library along the way. Basically anything old and/or weird is me, and the random contemporary songs where requests peppered in.
I had so many crazy interactions that I started bringing a digital recorder that let me record the crowd noise via a mic along with capturing a clean signal from the mixer. It’s definitely cool to hear the floor fill up as the night progressed. I miss that place.
This particular set was full of glitches because I had opened up my mixer to patch the sound card for time code vinyl and made it unhappy, so it cut out abruptly 2 or 3 times during my set. The first time it happened, I was caught lacking. By the time it cut out on me towards the end, I had a Whitney Houston gay bar banger ready to go on my phone that was hooked up to the AUX-in. First-world problems...
[MBP12->Xone:23C->TASCAM DR-40 in 4-channel mode for crowd noise along + line-in]

Next Episode

ChemBros_Radio_DJ_Set_2003

This mix is a bit of a sidequest as I put the finishing touches on a pretty fire N.E.R.D. mixtape that I’ve been working on.
Occasionally, I give flowers to some of the great pop tapes and CDs I grew up with. At times, I'll also include a mixtape from other artists who were highly influential to me, especially when they seem to be otherwise missing from the internet for some reason.
I stopped DJing in 1994, dropped out of college, and ran off to the Navy, realizing that rocking parties with two tape decks wasn't going to translate to club gigs anyway. For the next 20 years, I was just a DJ fanboy. During that time, I really dug the late '90s big beat scene, with artists like The Chemical Brothers, Fatboy Slim, The Crystal Method, and Groove Armada. The Chemical Brothers’ commercial mix CD, 'Brothers Gonna Work It Out,' was a massive influence, so much so that when I returned to DJing in 2013, now with the benefit of a laptop and controller, I specifically studied it until I could recreate it. Needless to say, their old DJ sets are a huge influence on me and all are worth a spin when you find them.
This particular Chemical Brothers DJ set has been on my hard drive for 21 years, titled “ChemBros_Soundsystem_XL_2003.mp3,” and was originally recorded from the radio in 2003. I most likely downloaded it from Kazaa or Limewire. It stayed in heavy rotation on my Creative MuVo MP3 player at the time. Now, it's nowhere to be found online, which is a shame, so I'm uploading it here as I finish up my N.E.R.D. mixtape. Enjoy — it knocks.
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