Those of you who have been frequent visitors to this site will know that I often mention the fact that I always have a variety of different mix concepts in mind, and that sometimes it will take months (or even years!) to turn an idea into an actual mix.
Sometimes I will cheerfully announce an idea for a mix and then won’t get around to doing it for, well, quite some time (as an example, see this thread on Bangingtunes where I’m asked about a UK acid trance mix that I announced I would be doing quite some time ago and had then more or less forgotten about).
Anyways, I thought a neat alternative would be to put the next mix up for a vote, and you can see the voting options on the right-hand side of the page. I’ll be keeping the vote up until Sunday the 18th of July to give people plenty of time to vote for a new mix. In the meantime I will be doing a short 15-20 track mix of some deeper dubstep tunes for a bit of summer flavour (see the tracklist from my set at last year’s Hackney Flea Market for a flavour), and there might well be a guest mix as well.
For those who are curious, here’s some more information about the different mix ideas:
Beyond The Valley Of The Acid Vixens (Acid) – A tough acid mix, a sibling to The Waveform Cult, running from tweaking acid house to full-power 303 mayhem.
Example tracks:
Carl Cox – Acid Charge
Joey Beltram – Time Warp
Planetary Assault Systems – In From The Night
Drop The Hammer 8 (Grime) – For the eighth installment of my Drop The Hammer series of crate-digging mixes, I was thinking of doing a mix of some of my favourite old skool grime instrumentals, which would probably be a lot of fun, as long as you like skroinky London electronic beats. Will undoubtedly include a very healthy dose of Wiley’s beats.
Example tracks:
Dexplicit – Change Formation
Low Deep – Jedi
Wiley – Ice Cream Man
Cold World (Techstep Drum n’ Bass) – Since it was techstep that first really turned me on to drum n’ bass, it would be quite a cool nostalgia trip for to do a new darkside drum n’ bass mix. It’s been a while since I’ve done one, and since the mixing is a bit dodgy in places on Silver Dawn, I’ve long thought that it would be a nice idea to do a new one … not sure how summery it would be, though!
Example tracks:
Decoder – Fuse
Ed Rush – Mothership
Peshay – The Nocturnal (Back On The Firm)
Heartcore (Hardtrance) – I’ve long wanted to do a mix of old skool fast German hardtrance, since it was listening to M-Zone tapes from Dreamscape and Helter Skelter back in the mid-90’s that first got me into hard trance. The only reason I’ve never done a mix of this stuff is because I love it so much that I’ve always worried I wouldn’t be able to do it justice – which I recognize is a stupid reason to put off doing something! This mix would also be the first really fast 4/4 mix I’ve done since Called To Valhalla, and I know that Socky has requested it (repeatedly!), so it may well be a good choice.
Example tracks:
Cortex Thrill – Innerspace
Mega ‘Lo Mania – Time
Ultimate – Hypnotic Feeling
Now You’re Cool (UK Funky/House) – Well, I’m nearly 30, married, and look at all the stuff I listen to … I’m definitely not cool any more! Well, not that I ever was. 😉
Anyways, what is cool right now is this whole post-dubstep/future garage/UK Funky crossover movement that has injected some fresh ideas into the house framework, and I’ve recently gotten quite interested in this stuff, so I thought a mix might be a nice idea for the summer! My mix would definitely be more on the deeper tip than a lot of the UK Funky stuff, which is often quite rnb-influenced (and is not to my taste, really).
Example tracks:
Addison Groove – Footcrab
DJ Zinc – Wile Out feat Ms Dynamite
Roska – Holograph
Squat Rocking 5 (Acid Techno) – My Squat Rocking mix series has always been very popular, so I’ve been thinking of doing a fifth edition that would go back to that classic London acid techno sound that we all know and love.
Example tracks:
DDR & The Geezer ‘Spades’
Kektex – Inner City Junkies
The Weathermen – Domination
There Must Be A Future (Acid Trance) – As I mentioned earlier in this point, for a long time I have promised (and failed to deliver) a UK acid trance mix. For those of you who remember London parties like Undertow, Pendragon, Techtonic, Antiworld and Trancentral back in the day, this would be the one for you. Pounding rhythms, soaring melodies, spiraling riffs … pure joy.
Example tracks:
Demonic Emotions – Stuck On A Space Trip (Jon The Dentist Remix)
Pablo Gargano – Everyone’s Future
Star Power – Nothing Can Save Us London (Truelove’s Lectrolux Mix)
Urban Takedown (Jump-Up Drum n’ Bass) – My final mix concept is for a new jump-up jungle mix featuring some of my favourite dancefloor bangers from 1995-1998. Maybe that stuff was a bit less revolutionary than the earlier jungle stuff, and some (ok, a lot) of it veered into the territory of outright cheese, but the best stuff to come out of that era of hip-hop influenced party drum n’ bass sound was just awesome. Tons of fun to listen to and to dance to, and much better (in my own humble opinion) than the second coming of jump-up in recent years, I feel that another mix in that style would be a nice complement to Don’t Panic and Firestorm.
Example tracks:
Dillinja – Mutha Fucka
DJ Red – Devastate
Roni Size – It’s Jazzy
Help me decide!