Feels like the right time for this..

DD: What’s kept your journey as an artist interesting? How long have you been developing yourself musically?  

The people I’ve met have made the journey both fascinating and harrowing.  I’ve encountered individuals in the artistic community who were brilliant, insane, deeply compassionate, and tragically flawed- sometimes all of the above.  I think you need to have a certain amount of intense interaction with other musicians to develop your own music; flesh and blood and verbal conflicts, otherwise you’re just dealing with brick and glass, which isn’t so bad, but then you’re just dancing about architecture.  Of course my previous statement is a bit ironic, considering that I mostly make music on my own now, which I’ve been doing for about 20 years.

DD: You’ve got some dark shit on here, what drives these kinds of songs? 

I’m always a bit surprised when people focus on the darkness of my music, but I know some individuals who won’t even listen to my stuff because they find it too disturbing.  Many songs that people consider to be dark are written in minor keys, so maybe I just prefer minor over major, but I also have very little tolerance for optimists.  I do think there’s quite a bit of gallows humor in my songs- why so serious?

DD: Who are some artists you identify with? 

Lately, I’ve been listening to a lot of Diamanda Galas, but I don’t really identify with her, she’s entirely unique.  She’s an artist who truly had the power to disturb and maybe even awaken people.  Of course the sticking point with her is usually the voice, but on her later material she sings in a lower register much of the time, which is a bit more accessible than her earlier work.  I actually don’t identify with most of the artists I enjoy, simply because I don’t have their talent, but I listen to a ton of music; from Thelonious Monk to Fever Ray, I try to take it all in.

DD: Have you been able to share your music within the music community of Seattle?

Well, the Stranger and Seattle Times have given me positive reviews, but my only interaction with Seattle based musicians has been over the internet via Soundcloud.  I remixed a song by Ernest Robinson, who calls himself Thunderclap Headache.  He lives in Seattle but moved here from Cleveland.  Most recently I remixed, ‘The Only One’, by Mono in VCF.  One of their founding members, Jordan Luckman, contacted me and asked if I would remix one of their songs, an offer I would have been foolish to turn down.  It has this menacing undercurrent that I really appreciate, and features a chorus that runs entirely counter to all the, “I’ll love you forever” nonsense that so many pop songs embrace.  I’d be happy if you featured it here, but that’s up to you.  I also speak somewhat frequently with a local musician who calls himself Gronxkey, love his music, very unique.

DD: Any last words?

Thanks for featuring my work, and like my friend Bellicose says, “Never regret monkey noises.”   -cheers

Crazy Old Bat on Soundcloud 

– Jimi Jaxon

DD: Are you a sly fellow? Your artist name has some sass to it.

Quite a hard question. The name started out as something people could easily remember. It was that or styleblenders. To go back to your question. I’m the kind of guy that normally is good with people (kinda like the good neighbor next door). But when I’ve had a glass or two who knows what’s going to happen. 

DD: What kind of mindset do you feel you’re currently in? How does this affect your new productions?

 My music is based on three things:

Love for the drums: Since I was 16 I started collecting drumbreaks (when I seriously influenced by Hip Hop). Now I have about 3gig with just breaks and drum loops. When you get older you start to listen to more electronic music. And so I started to collect samples of Drummachines. With the help from some Synth enthusiasts I have over 50 drumcomputers sampled. Last week I was listening to all my old productions and I quickly realized that almost none of my productions is really 4/4. I think this will not change in the future, the only thing I’m doing right now is creating drums with my modular gear and layer that with the drum computers or breaks.

Synths: I always wanted to have synths, a good friend of mine (and good producer) Olaf rubens told me not to buy them. Instead he advised me to work with plugins. I was stubborn and bought a Microkorg several weeks later. But didn’t do much with it because you don’t have enough control buttons and its not well arranged. So 2 years ago I bought my first (semi) Modular synth the Korg Ms 20 and it didn’t stop there. Now I have 3 modular synths (old and rare ones) and I’m waiting for a new modular synth (Only 50 will be made and I’ll have nr 16).

Nostalgia: My older brother had 2 big cases of cassettes and cd’s. Mostly hip hop but also a lot of rock (punk to metal) and some good DNB and electro. This was a good start for me. Now I search a lot of 60-70-early 80’s music, I always have the feeling that music was better in those days. Maybe because now there’s a lot of mainstream crap on the radio and nothing is really fresh these days. A great example of this is the first acid track made in Bombay 1982..

In the future I will have 2 pseudonyms, one as Dirtytrickz and the other will be analog.  I already have some ideas and half tracks (even names for the pseudonym and names for the tracks). To do it right it will take me a couple of years to finish several tracks because making analog music is hard work.

DD: What’s the best show you’ve ever seen?

It would be Kraftwerk @ pukkelpop and Soulwax (Soulwaxmas in Paris).

DD: oh mannnnnnn! How about the best advice you’ve been given as an artist? 

Don’t rush things, take your time to develop. Be creative but don’t forget to be productive!

DD: Final words? It’s been a nice pleasure. 

Yeah some shoutouts to: Dieter D’hulster (He’s my dj compagnon together we’re called Jack 2 jack) He was always the first who supported me and I wouldn’t be this far without him! Sven Dobbels, made me believe in the power of analog gear and learned me the basics of dj’ing. Also gave me a different point of view about music. Michael Verscheure (aka Mr Clean) I played my first vinyl record at his place when I was 15, this is where it all began. And Olaf Rubens for teaching me how to produce music.

I’m forever grateful to all these guys.

Dirtytrickz on Soundcloud

http://twitter.com/faneflip

– Jimi Jaxon

Welcome to the world of Stereoheroes, hailing from France..

INTERVIEW 

DD: You’ve got a lot of energy! what keeps you pumped up?  

When you arrive on stage, kids are partying, they want to dance, you just give them everything you got inside you ! Seeing them happy makes us want to continue.

DD: Clean looking website, nice. How long have you been producing as Stereoheroes?  

We started early 2008.

DD: What’s a Stereoheroes party usually look like? 

Two crazy dudes jumping on stage, playing whatever they feel like playing from house to drum and bass, just about everything. Lot of vodka, drunk audience, big communion in the power of electronic dance music.

DD: What’s helped your production process stay fresh and innovative? 

We don’t listen to a lot of music and so we don’t get too much inspiration. Basically I think we just do what we feel like doing when we wake up in the morning. Sometimes it will be electro-rock, sometimes Hip-Hop. We love a lot of different styles and we just can’t do the same track again and again.

DD: What’s the most important thing to hang onto as an artist?  

Do your own thing, don’t try to sound like someone else. Keep your head fresh.

DD: Any plans to make it up to Seattle? 

Damn ! Would love to, we just saw the airport last time. Hopefully for the next tour.

http://soundcloud.com/stereoheroes/

– Jimi Jaxon

Super excited to debut my summer playlist for the local blog, Seattle In High Def. Local music from Cedaa, Sphyramid, Crooked Teeth, Null.dll and myself. 

These songs are in a very special order, just hit play on the first track and let the mix roll..

I’ve been anxiously waiting to share this feature. This duo have been working tirelessly on their album, “Feed Villian Swing”, which was released on Red Couch Records (6/28/11). I highly encourage you to head over to their Bandcamp and snag it for $7. Dungeons and DJ’s have graciously donated two exclusive tracks to Disco Droppings, “Way Down” and “Knight Riders”. These are placed a little further down in this post, go find em!

I will be playing this album out in future DJ sets, Seattle will know about Dungeons and DJ’s! 

INTERVIEW 

DD: Welcome Dungeons and DJ’s! How is it down in Texas? 

D&D: Pretty swell, I stayed up all night making music…on my second cup of coffee…have some fresh herbs to enjoy…I can’t complain =)

DD: I was just at a small party with some friends, played them some tracks from your Soundcloud. They dug it! I’m really interested in the world influenced electronic songs. What got you turned onto these kinds of influences?

D&D: Talking Heads & David Byrne “Naked” was a heavily world music influenced album and it struck me at a pretty young age,….Bobby Mcferrin, all the Reggae and Dub Culture from Jamaica, all stuff I was exposed to in the 80’s and 90’s as a youngster, my father is jeweler/sculptor/luthier so I spent a lot of time at festivals and music events…

My music is often sample based and I use everything I’ve ever collected in my musical journeys and listening experiences, even stuff like KPM movie and commercial music gets sampled… I’ve always been into all of it, jazz, world music, tribal chanting, punk, gypsy swing, folk, I don’t give a fuck rock, calypso, latin jazz… whatever…. music is music and it’s all beautiful, if it has soul and is done with practiced hands and minds…

Some recent Soundcloud material is my experimenting with native latin rythm’s (in particular Peruvian and Columbian ) and tons of 1920’s swing and gypsy jazz. I’m trying to take it in a futuristic direction, but also stay true to the roots of the music. Really taking a bare essentials approach with most of it and leaving a lot of the effects, as I’ve grown kinda tired of hearing the same drop and the same filter in/out in some of the current electro swing and world electronic scenes…

DD: What do you enjoy most about producing? 

D&D: The joy I get from it!!! It’s def all about the love…even if nobody listened to my music I’d still be making it in my living room/bedroom/studio…if I didn’t have electronics (I make pretty much all my music digitally) I’d be banging on hand drums and basses and piano’s, making music just gets me really excited and engaged and happy. =)

It’s a spine tingle…thats the best way I can describe it, I think my brain likes making music so much it releases extra seratonin when im workin on tracks or something….

DD: What future plans are there for Dungeons & DJ’s? If you’re ever up in Seattle come find me so we can play a show together =) 

D&D: Who knows? We have a lot of ideal people in our family LOL…. we got plans for culture based websites & blogging, really want to just start playing live more regularly (both DJ’ing and doing live original sets) and developing a relationship with the party people and heads of Austin, Texas. =)

We’re playing some bad ass weddings/parties for friends in the very near future, which is always intimate and fun, and a few bigger festivals later on this summer, and we always throw supreme underground parties around town  …. in June we started our first monthly event called “Whomp Stomp Wednesdays” at a spot in downtown Austin…focusing on “bass/crunk/future/funk”… or whatever that is interpreted as by the resident DJ’s and myself that evening hahaha…doubt youll hear any Skrillex or Nero or Rusko type dubstep tho lol, respect all those cats but I’ve heard enough for the moment…we’re more about the soul and atmosphere and funkiness. =)

…Will hopefully have some tracks released later this summer, sending them off for mastering…been working on some very rooted, simple, beautiful garage/bass/brainstep style beats and really happy with the results got a few of the tracks posted on the Soundcloud like “only u” & “queen of sky” tho both those versions weren’t final mixes…still gives you a good idea of how my studio time has been being spent I think….really itching to get back into producing some really different sounding electro-swing future gypsy weird world beat glitch stuff soon as well…

http://soundcloud.com/dungeonsanddjs

– Jimi Jaxon