The album, the artist, the audience. Are we going full circle?

Grudgingly, I find myself starting to agree with vinyl freaks. Weird. 

I posted a while back about the interesting origins of what we now call an album.  This was in the context of our new, brave MP3 world of digital downloads. After all, when you can cram an entire library onto a tiny piece of plastic, who needs those ancient concepts of singles, albums, EPs and CDs? Tech developments have moved so very fast. I'm not entirely sure that's all good.  

The vinyl revival was a surprise to me. It's really not a huge slice of the market. Vinyl gets more attention than it deserves because it's a retro vintage fashion thing. Personally, I find the obsession with vinyl as a style statement slightly ridiculous. 

But there's another reason for the continued survival of the album, over and above vinyl fetishes. And it's a lot more valid than a business proposition or a badge of identity.  

Miles Hunt. Straight outta Stourbridge to a world tour.

Friendly Company! The Stuffies are coming to yours

 Miles and Erica Nockalls - from The Wonder Stuff pledge page  

Like a thousand other towns across the country, developers and lousy town planning have ripped the guts out of Stourbridge. The town is a tangle of road improvements and pompous corporate new-build. It's totally out of step with the charming, human scale of the unprofitable parts left behind.

I head along old streets of small terraced houses, down a clearly ancient pathway behind a church. I fetch up in a quiet neighbourhood boozer, one of several I'd passed. No piped music, no fruit machines, no Sky Sports; instead, a large affable dog and some excellent ale. 

And Miles Hunt of The Wonder Stuff. 

The BBC's shiny digital future. Still waiting.

Elephants? Pah. There's a digital dinosaur in the room. 

I was at the BBC Mailbox offices in Birmingham last week. They've redone the entrance. You can now check out hot BBC WM studio action as you walk up to the reception desk. This is a good thing. I always like to see real live radio, made in Birmingham.

The sad coffee outlet and gift shop have gone. Ironically, there's now a life-size Peaky Blinders backdrop. You can take selfies! With Cillian Murphy and his gang! Well, it's nice to see Peaky Blinders stuff in Brum - that's a first too. 

Next to it is an area showcasing new digital developments. It's manned by pleasant guides who walk you though the new toys. I had a play while I waited. And then I asked questions. Well, I do that.

Thank you, Paul Murphy

We've lost one of the greats. We've lost a friend.

Photo Richard Shakespeare     

Paul Murphy passed away last week. His family announced his passing on Friday. It was a difficult day. The news was met with an explosion, a passionate outpouring of grief which rippled out across the world. Rightly.  

Paul was a wonderful, open, extravagantly talented man with a razor-sharp mind,   boundless optimism, and lively curiosity about anything and everything. There didn't seem to be anything he could not do.

And he told stories. Oh, how he told his stories...

Loves, losses, gripes, glories and gratitude in 2015

A rueful, joyful look back 

It's been a full-on year. I wrote, a lot. Did audio production, a lot. Halfway through the year, I pulled out of a draining work situation and cleared my head. Then, naturally, I took a deep breath and promptly hurled myself into new fields of work, scrambling up fresh and steep learning curves. Some of it has been difficult and disappointingly fruitless. Other stuff has succeeded beyond my wildest expectations. You think I'd have learned by now. 

Here's some of the things I stumbled across this year, some gripes and some regrets... and a few little treats, after the jump.

Is Facebook over?

It's a question I'm asking most weeks. Musos might well be asking the same thing.

Over time, things grow, peak and decline. Everything has an allotted timespan, even global IT monsters. Those timespans are getting shorter. 

Facebook is posting fat profits because it's now a mobile platform: the app of choice for idiots texting at the movies. But the number of people actually sharing stuff is going down. And that has big implications.

I think this is about its usefulness to people like me and many others, possibly you too. I'm now wondering if it's still much use at all. My page hits from Facebook have dropped; from elsewhere, they're up.

Since at least 2013, there's been speculation that Facebook deliberately hobbles some types of posts, to get people to pay. I won't do that for my blog, which is a labour of love. It's ironic: Facebook gets free content and a data mountain to mine from us, but we're then supposed to pay to use it. 

I'm not happy, and I'm pretty sure other people feel the same. I wonder.... have we seen peak Facebook? And what might this mean for musicians?

Catching the buzz: Rhino and The Ranters

That critical moment when it all starts to work...

Assuming there's merit and talent in a band, and that the band then backs it up with graft and a bit of a marketing push, there's usually a point when word gets out. Suddenly, big numbers show up for gigs. Suddenly, the name gets bandied around. Suddenly, there are faces turning up to check out the new boys on the block. Suddenly, people you tend to listen to are mentioning them.

Last week, at Dylan Gibbons' Blues Night at the Spotted Dog, you could see the signs. There were faces aplenty, come to take a look at Rhino and The Ranters. And it was a cracking gig. 

Now, the GOOD news. After the storms, Songwriters Café is back!

A Birmingham institution returns. I'm really looking forward to this. 

Songwriters Café, led by Paul Murphy and Valeria Rispo, is back for a short season starting on Thursday September 4th, and running for nine weeks in all. Opening night is already full.

It's a magical affair. Paul and Valeria have crafted a wonderful, intimate performance space, fashioned below the treehouse Paul built years ago, and now lovingly refurbished. Paul is Master of Ceremonies; he'll do a song or two, and then four acts will each play short sets of around 20 minutes to the invited live audience and a (much larger) worldwide online audience, with an interval halfway though. 

The craft of songwriting

The emphasis is on song writing. Paul programmes a very wide range of talent, from new and edgy to consummate veterans. The trick? You won't know who's on until you get there or you tune in to the stream. But the concerts are always interesting and sometimes unbelievably fabulous. 

Donations to fund events are key. This season you can donate in advance; you then become a member to guarantee a place at each of the house gigs. That's a good thing: it helps to pay for the massive overhaul that the performance space needed. The 2012 season was a soggy affair: it rained on 12 out of the 13 weeks. Then the following winter did so much damage to the old structure, that a costly rebuild was necessary. So remember that when the hat comes round. 

The result is a watertight, slightly larger space, with a few little extra wrinkles added for those who are there on the night, and for the online audience too: this season, the live stream will go out in stereo for the first time.

A second emphasis is on the audience. Songwriters Café audiences listen; they give the performers space and respect. To me, that is so, so welcome. I've lost count of the number of times noisy idiots have disprespected someone up on stage who is giving of themselves. And it's getting worse, not better. Live music from committed talent, young or old, is one of those gifts that you can't put a price on. Songwriters Café supports that, brilliantly.

Laptop-lit: Rispo on chatbox, Valk on Virtual DJ. By Richard Shakespeare    

Online streams

Access is limited: these are private house gigs for invited audiences. But you can join in online, and you'll be very welcome: online audience response is key and very much appreciated. You'll normally find me doing online continuity from 8.30 pm UK time, warming up to the night's events with choice cuts from previous seasons. When we're live, the chatbox is hosted by Valeria. Songwriters Café is also very happy to hear from radio stations near and far who might like to relay the stream, live or deferred. Give me a shout in the first instance.

Tasters from previous years

I'm putting together a taster series of short programmes to celebrate the restart; you can also link to them from the Songwriter's Café website. Here's the first.

And here's the second.

There will be more available as specials, on the Songwriters Café pages. 

To find out more, follow this link. Access is by invitation only; Songwriters Café is a house gig.

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Joan Armatrading's BIG last tour

Joan Armatrading has announced her last tour, kicking off later this year. She isn't retiring from live shows, but this is the big last tour. Big? It's huge. 

Joan is booked for over 50 UK dates so far with European and North American dates to follow. It's just her on guitar and piano. She's taking on a lot. 

I saw Joan at the old Birmingham Odeon in 1975, after she released 'Back To The Night'. She opened for A&M labelmates Supertramp - so she sang her very personal songs to progrock kiddies in greatcoats. It's all a long time ago, but I'm sure the stage was awash with unwavering, unwatchable red light. Almost certainly she had a crappy sound mix. The lot of the support act. 

I enjoyed her set. Supertramp was another matter, so I left, crossing a post-gig Joan coming out onto the street with her mates. I hollered out 'Good set, Joan!' and got a lovely smile back.

We met later when Joan was ferried around radio stations to plug albums. I don't think she enjoyed this. But I asked for another interview because, dammit, Joan's a really important artist, and this is going to be her last tour. And, hooray, she agreed. 

The Details: Too Late To Stop Now

When is a good time to start a band? And what do you want to do and say when you do start?

The Details attempt louche

Last week, at a motorway service station, two wannabe rock stars waltzed in as I slouched out. They were perfect. Shades, crucial hair, skinny jeans, tats, floppy t-shirts under leather jackets, and the killer look-at-me-I’m-a-star-flounce. 

Of course, had they been the real thing, they wouldn’t have strutted into Cherwell Valley services for a pee with the rest of us. But they wanted attention, throwing shapes while loading up on Krispy Kreme. Bless. 

It’s always a tricky thing, being in a band. But at least these boys had youth on their side to bash through the obstacles.

It’s trickier throwing yourself back in the game again after 40 years. The Details, four excellent musicianly veterans of the Birmingham scene, have just released a thoughtful, demanding album, loaded with sparkling fretwork and crafted songs. The biggest challenges they face will be getting new listeners to work at their music. And... they are old. Very old. Um, like me.

So where are we? A conversation with Jazz enablers and new generation players.

OK, go ahead - you define Jazz for me, because I don't know where to begin. 

Defined or not, it’s one of those areas marked by love for musicianship, experimentation, willfulness, and avoidance of genre definition. Fashionable? Hell, no, but that’s never a bad thing. And, from it, a steady flow of new genres seems to emerge – also never a bad thing.

It's not surprising that 50s Jazz was so tightly bound up with 50s existentialism: both are centred on the individual and the moment. And like too many other music areas, Jazz is a place where pigeonholing, snobbery and tribalism can seriously taint the music-making process.

And it seems to be heavily freighted with assumptions and contradictions. At one end of the spectrum, it's seen as safe, just arty and just nicely experimental enough for countless cosy festivals each year. It's also a cute label for record companies to bolt on to their offerings to give them more credibility.. At the other end, it's full of explosive, passionate and uncompromising music that simply isn't going to wait for you to catch up. 

Five things I learned this year

The Radio To Go 2012 review part 1: You can learn a lot from your blog's figures. 

Clicker is a freebie app in the Apple store

The total pageview count at Radio To Go clicked past 40,000 this week: mainly people checking out the 1EYE / Del Camino post.

I'm pleased. I launched the blog in 2007 to plug my radio consult business. A regular topic was how local radio and local music can do good things for each other. But as radio shrank - four years of systematic merging of local radio into national 'brands' - I found myself writing more and about my other great passion: music. Preferably fresh,  honest and local.

Up to Christmas 2011, blog page views were tiny: less than 9000 in four years. But this time last year, at the Destroyers’ Brum Christmas party, it struck me that the radio posts were now almost irrelevant. On the other hand, here I was, watching a band that people care about; much more interesting, and very different. And that's what put me on a new path. Thank you, Louis, Paul, and company. 

So this past year, I've focussed much more on music, and things have changed - a lot. Now it's the end of the year, so here's a two-part 2012 review, starting with how people have used this blog. I’ve learned a lot.

Re-Thinking Regional Media? Judging by the latest radio and circulation figures, that might just be a very good idea.

Old regional media: deckchairs, Titanic. New regional media: Um - we'll get back to you.

Oops. Anyone got any ideas?

Thursday 25th October was interesting. Three things happened, all of which should be - but aren’t - connected.  

The first was the monthly gathering for the Birmingham Music Network, which I couldn’t attend, because I was at the second event. This was Re-thinking Regional Media, a debate on futures for, er, Regional Media. 

It was a good and informative day: a variety of opinions, but not a lot of cold hard facts, were laid out and chewed over. I was there as a discussion facilitator: to steer discussions with a break-out group, in the hope of pulling out some definitive and positive conclusions. I’m afraid we didn’t get too far; nor did any of the other groups.  

Thursday also saw the release of the latest clutch of audience research figures for radio, which you can dig into at the excellent Media UK site. Taken together, these are shockingly bad for local radio in the region, pretty much across the board. I’ll go into details later.

These three things just don’t connect up. They should. And that’s the tragedy.

The background 
Partly, the terrible fact that local media – newspapers, tv and radio in the West Midlands – is now a burnt-out wasteland. Again and again, talk was of lost impact, falling circulation, and declining revenues. Truth be told, I met more people who used to be in radio, who used to be journalists or in local telly, than people who are still employed in these industries.  

Bright spots? not a whole lot. There is the will to see things improve, which is good, but not surprising, given the make up of the conference. There was the acknowledgement of new tech tools and analytics, especially from the estimable Matt Locke of Storythings; I lapped that up. Several inventive bloggers attended, and lots of independent video types were there, with brave and complex ideas, representing the remnants of the once vibrant television industry in the region.   

How did we get here?  
I'll cite three factors.

First: institutionally, Birmingham and the West Midlands have been outflanked and outmanoeuvred by the competition. To be blunt, Manchester has played a blinder, for well over a decade; Birmingham has done exactly the opposite. So now we have Media City in Manchester, and the BBC preparing to exit the Mailbox. For a number of reasons, the civic and business infrastructure and the decision makers that could and should have kept jobs and work in Brum simply didn't step up to the plate, most noticeably and wastefully at the BBC. Job losses across the sector must be in excess of 1000 since 2000.

Secondly: the web has simply led people away from existing media; no big surprise there. We don't use radio to find hot new music anymore (apart from, maybe, some users of 6music), and that's a tragedy. Radio especially, but Television and Print too have increasingly retreated from any form of real engagement with their markets, obsessing with 'brands' and ‘efficiencies’, with programming avoiding risk and offering an increasingly depressing uniformity

Thirdly, 'local' has simply become a dirty word, especially from a metropolitan perspective. Given the default thinking in London about creativity north of Watford, that's hardly a surprise. Ironically, production technology has helped radio cut costs; but it has  helped bands and video makers much more. It has ushered in a wonderful explosion in local music and video production, which has been almost completely ignored.

Many speakers at the debate reminded me of how much people at contemporary media industries, especially radio, are in denial. It was ironically amusing to hear an ex-employee of Global Radio claim that its local stations (Capital Birmingham and Heart West Midlands) were at an all-time high in the region, when a quick look at Media UK’s figures for those stations (here and here), released that same day, shows that they are both at all-time lows. 

It was galling to hear from Stuart Taylor, the very impressive ex-chairman of Guardian Media Group Radio (owners of Smooth, who have in turn sold out to Global), that he expects even more consolidation at radio to allow it to to survive. And it was very frustrating to note that Orion Media, owners of Free, have again recorded disappointing figures, at a time when I and many others had been hoping for some sign of a local media fightback against national brands. The fact is that no local or quasi-local radio service has shown an increase this quarter. The best that can be said is that some stations are holding their own… and none of these are market leaders.

The decline of 20th century media
Marc Reeves from RJF public affairs, an ex-editor or the Birmingham Post, gave a sad but  perceptive overview of the decline at traditional media. He was particularly interesting on the abilities of old-school local media to reach out and relate to its audiences. And that, quite possibly, is the key.

Any media organisation lives or dies by its ability to build trust and credibility, and hopefully be liked by its audience. As social media gurus constantly tell us, it’s the way you connect to your audience that matters. It’s particularly interesting to see that the most traditional forms of radio continue to prosper at network level at the BBC. I put this down to exactly those key factors: trust and credibility - the ability to acknowledge, reach out and touch an audience.

That leads me back to Marc’s point. I feel, and I eventually said this towards the end of the debate, that the relentless retreat from localism, driven and justified by business priorities, has left Brand Radio increasingly unable to connect to its audiences. Listeners in turn continue to leave in favour of things they can relate to. If the programming strategy of Brand Radio was to compete effectively with the BBC channels, it has comprehensively failed. As Matt Deegan points out, Xfm is now trounced by 6 music. Elsewhere, Radio 2 continues blithely on its way as the 800lb gorilla in the radio room that nothing will dislodge… until, this being the BBC, it shoots itself in the foot, of its own volition.

A way forward?

So let’s come back to local media. Media needs content. It feeds on it. Local media might do well to stop obsessing about heavily researched and safely acceptable content to the exclusion of all else. Local relevance, played right, gives a competitive usp. If – on whatever platform emerges in the next few years – local media succeeds in reinventing itself with attractive, credible multi-stranded content, it won’t be by relying on playing, or talking about, the exact same stuff everyone else plays and talks about. 

The big 21st century difference, in my view, is that the new platforms might well be local, but now they have a global reach. That’s what could make new and creative services, local, specialised or otherwise, stand out, and more significantly, pay their way. Brilliant thinking comes for free. Brilliant individual content that could be exclusive to a station, that reflects and is of the market the station serves, is out there for the taking. You just need a bit of editorial judgment, which is becoming an elusive commodity in our industries. 

Last week I wrote about Magic Garden studios, where Gavin Monaghan had recorded a session with local band Jaws. It was done for Radio 1 - no local take-up here. Take note, local boys: Radio 1 is out there, looking for exciting stuff in your own back yard. That said, there is absolutely no reason why Radios 1, 1xtra, 2 and 6 could not be beaten to the punch, every single time, by local stations. That would be a start… but only the the start of a five year or longer battle to claw back market share for local media.   

This probably won’t happen. What’s far more likely is that yet more new operations will emerge, probably online, probably very tech-savvy in new and creative ways, to nibble away at the traditional audience, crumb by crumb. I wouldn’t mind seeing that happen one little bit. In fact I’d be happy to help.

I mentioned the Birmingham Music Network at the start of this post. It’s ironic that this gathering of musicians and music business boosters also took place on the same day as the regional media debate. These are two worlds that need each other. They could be very good for each other. But they ignore each other. If they, somehow, found a way to work with each other, we might see some interesting changes. 

Links:
Media UK; see also James Cridland's and Matt Deegan's blogs
Re-thinking Regional Media
Campaign for Regional Broadcasting Midlands is an online petition to try to save those local jobs that are left at the BBC

Four club DJs - Sam Redmore, Marc Reck, DJ Switch and Karl Jones - talk. Off-mic, of course.

Hang the DJ! Oops, wrong century. Then, DJs were radio beasts, sometimes supporting music they believed in. Now, with a few exceptions, that role sits with club DJs.  

Photo courtesy djswitchbeatz..co.uk

What does the term DJ actually mean? I asked that in a radio workshop last week. Nobody thought it had much to do with radio; it was all about clubbing. 

The term DJ – originally, short for ‘Disk Jockey’ – has been around for nearly 80 years. It was never meant to be flattering, allegedly coined by a US Network News giant to describe a continuity announcer who happened to have an on-air records show.  My first mentor, the great Jim Santella, still on air at WBFO in Buffalo, New York after 40 years, described Radio DJing as ‘pimping on other people’s reflected glory’, and there’s a lot of truth in that. 

Now,  DJs with actual discs are pretty rare. And you could say there are few, if any, pure DJs in radio now. They’re presenters or talent. Or... pre-recorded voice links. 

Some things don't change. DJs are still overwhelmingly male, and there's a LOT of unjustified ego flying around. But today’s DJ is far more likely to work in studios or clubs, interacting directly and immediately with live audiences. Critically, Club DJs can also produce their own music and increasingly, they collaborate creatively with musicians.  I talked with four of Birmingham’s finest for this post. 

Sam Redmore has made a name for himself at Leftfoot and his Moseley Freestyle nights, and bangs out both inventive short treatments of songs, and some sterling extended mixes. Expanding Freestyle into a live music event has given the event a massive boost. He recently remixed Chris Tye's 'New York City Rain' single, which you can find below, along with links to some extraordinary other work, rooted in his respect for his original sources of inspiration.

Photo: Pit Photography

Karl Jones, aka Malicious DJ, played a critical role in bridging live music and dj work when he embarked on the discussions that led to the forming of Alternative Dubstep Orchestra. Karl remains a part of ADO, as well as the Brotherhood of Filth. Karl also does a lot of brand new work. There's several links to some of Karl's work down the post.

Phto courtesy DJ Switch website

DJ Switch is three time DMC World DJ Champion, the first DJ to play at the BBC Proms at the Albert Hall last year. He's also part of the Brotherhood of Filth, and an early member of the ADO collective. Again, there's clips and links further down the post. 

Photo: Rob Nicholas

And Marc Reck (DJ Narrative) has waaay too many projects on to describe fully… but they’re all interesting. 

This post has partly came about though lengthy chats Marc and I had about how the worlds of Radio and Club could work together, when we both worked in our different ways on Project X Presents. I'm still not sure they can, but Marc has some enterprising approaches, discussed below, as do all the DJs featured here. Check his website….  and see the links below

So give me a definition of a DJ….? 

Sam Redmore: He’s the guy who plays the music in a club! But it’s not the time you spend with the people on front of you, it’s finding the music in the first place.

Marc Reck: There's different kinds… someone who plays & manipulates recorded material to create something else - an atmosphere or collective experience - or a radio show, a mixtape, an audio journey… 

DJ Switch: It’s interesting that people resist calling DJs 'musicians', and this extends to DJs themselves. The exception is turntablism. 

Karl Jones: A DJ is there to musically educate and bridge the gap between the recording artists and the general public, whilst maintaining the desired atmosphere and feeling required for the event or show with the correct track selection and mixing techniques.

What’s more important: the creativity of the mix or the live audience? How responsible do you feel to your audience?

KJ: If the crowd is right I feel like I should be paying to see them. I feel a responsibility to share good music, to share the reaction and see what reaction it brings out. Good music is like a good joke. I build my sets up from one liners to knock knocks before dropping in some classic gems. It’s vital the DJ remembers he’s there to entertain the crowd and not just himself.

MR: I think the mix and the audience are equally important. Ultimately the audience's experience comes first. I've seen people talk about how cutting edge or uncompromising their musical taste is, and then see them clear a diverse party crowd dance floor. The great DJs are ones that can, in front of any audience, keep the whole place up and do something creative or unique.

MR: The reason I started DJing was to share music. Probably the biggest thing for me is to play a song that I love, and see people enjoying it. 

DJS: Audience, definitely. There's no sense in doing something mind-boggingly creative if the people you're doing it for can't appreciate it on some level. But don't take that to mean ruling out creativity by any stretch.

There’s some interesting developments going on with all of you: longer mixes, which ‘feel’ like conventional radio shows, except that you’re not talking… it’s interesting to follow the flow of ideas 

SR: I guess you could say that. They tend to have a beginning, a middle and end, and the different styles of music represent plot twists. I like them to feel like they're always going somewhere.

KJ: People love to hear tracks they know and love, but when they don’t see them coming they seem to love them a whole lot more. With the software now available you can now put out any sound you have, instantly. That makes for speed and flexibility of expression – it’s much easier than ever before.

MR: I love the creativity that samples, binaural recordings, fx, and technology offer; how you can juxtapose these with music. It’s what made me learn turntablism and get into midi controllers. My first creative attempts at Narrative (DJ Narrative) were probably with the Fear & Love mix cd in 2006. Adapting the idea to performances made me find new ways to organise and play my music and sample library for maximum live DJ flexibility.

DJS: I often work with Bass6, who heads up the beatbox community and is one of the most energetic hosts you'll see. And, wonderfully, when he's not there, I have his intros & outros recorded from one of our joint live sets. If I don't use his voice, it's someone else's intro which I nabbed. I make sure I can intro myself if there's an MC there or not. 

A Radio DJ hopes that his or her show is listened to, but he or she can never really know. Radio listeners may let you into their lives, but you’re gone in a flash when it’s time to feed the cat or answer the phone. A live audience, on the other hand, tells you straight if it likes you or not. So if, at its peak, the essence of DJing these days is about working with an audience, and seeing where the collective mood takes you (and everyone else), it’s no wonder that for so many DJs, the club DJ experience completely eclipses the radio DJ experience. Smaller audiences, certainly… but they’re right there, in the flesh, and they talk back.

Best Live moment?   

MR: So many for different reasons... the first Project X, playing with 3 music stages, and an unforgettable vibe… the 2nd one for the string quartet & really exploring narrative via the Heroes Journey. All the Mr Elephant events for the diversity and interactivity. Birmingham Opera for the what it opened up for me musically. Shambala in the rammed out Kamikaze tent was incredible. Oh and the custom made events! - Especially the 2nd one which led to the Night times collaborations, and their very kind awards and gig of the year review. 

KJ: Performing alongside DJ Switch at a secret venue in London. 6hrs of non stop madness! I don’t think any record played for more than 1min.

SR:Tough to choose, but one that stands out was at the Garden Festival in Croatia a couple of years ago. Just as the sun was setting I played one of my all-time favourite songs, Sebastien Tellier's "La Ritournelle". The crowd was really into it, and at the end of the track there was a round of applause - something I've never witnessed during a DJ set before (apart from at the end of a set / night).

DJS: The first year I was at Glastonbury I closed the Shangri-La stage, which was epic. It was 4-5 am and pure ram-a-jam, the sun rose over the course of the hour and the crowd heaved like a single organism. That will stay with me forever. My 3rd DMC world title is definitely up there. It was the year I was most happy with performance-wise.

Just as with last week’s post, tech has completely transformed the tools a DJ has to play with. On the rare occasions I DJ these days, I take a laptop loaded with mp3s and play them out through the freebie version of  Virtual DJ, something most pro DJs might regard as little more than a toy. But any kit can let you down…

Worst moment?   

MR: Probably when the equipment fails just before the gig. A great example of where tech crew are legendary, sorting out the issue where there seems to be no solution. I’ve had a few times with promoters saying there’s enough space to setup… then finding there's none until your set, which can make smooth changeovers pretty tricky.  

SR: My laptop gave up on me one night at the Bull's Head. I managed to get one track going, but had to dash upstairs into the office where most of my records are kept and frantically try to pick out a few others that would work before the track that was playing ran out. The records are kind of scattered all over the place, so it's impossible to know where to look. I dread to think what I ended up returning with...

DJS: I got talked into trying out black cider one night, and ended up finishing off 4 bottles just before I started playing. I remember getting onto the decks and thinking "wow, my hands are a lot further away from my head than they usually are!" I don't think the set was that bad, but it's a moment that's kept me in check ever since. The promoter told me in the morning "oh I recorded your set last night" and I replied "never EVER play it back to me!"

KJ: Honestly......I’ve loved every single minute so far!

Personally, I’m particularly interested in how the intensity of the DJ’s performance with a live crowd could ever be ported into a radio show. It's like squaring a circle - you can get closer and closer, but you'll never get perfection.  I don’t really think you can achieve that perfection, any more than a live music show can completely transfer onto an audio file. 

So: do you think club mixing can work on radio (I don't, myself... but I’m open to persuasion)

SR: Well if by club mixing you mean extended DJ mixes, then definitely yes. It all depends on the DJ in question, but I've heard some great sets on things like the Radio 1 Essential Mix. It's no longer about interacting with the crowd in the same way that playing in a club to an audience is, more of a chance to showcase some great music and put it together in an interesting and creative way.

DJS: I don't see why not. I've always enjoyed going down to London and tuning in to Rinse down there. No idea who's playing but just vibing along to the tracks. I'm normally like that when I go into clubs anyways.
In terms of explanation, seeing the poster for the gig you go to gives you the context - it attracts your audience & tells you who's on. Radio has to give that context in some form - if it's not by listings, why not by announcer? Fills the same role as the MC at the gig.  Moderation...I was stunned by a recent act of censorship. I did a mix for 1Xtra last year and put in a track called "The Hip Hop War", which basically had a chorus going 'bredrin' and 'blud'. I think the mix went out at 9, the track came on and first they censored 'bredrin' - which was a bit stupefying - and then they cut out the rest of the track which had 'blud' in it. Considering the station carries quite a strong urban ethic in it’s' image, and they still took that rather bizarre step when the mix went out after the watershed, it felt very backward.

KJ: There is a place for continuous mixes to be played on air but on the whole I would rather learn something from what I’m hearing - not just learning if I like it or not. I want to know who it’s by? what’s their story? Radio taught me that music goes much further than just what you’re hearing. As a producer it’s great having your tracks played on air but it’s always better when somebody tells the listeners who it’s by and when it’s out etc. Radio without any dialogue is kinda like looking at the pictures of a comic but not reading the story, you miss out on half the enjoyment.  

MR:  I found that hosting the Mr Elephant Radio show (on Rhubarb Radio and elsewhere) as a whole mix with hosting presented different limitations. The goals were to share and promote the best new music while trying to represent where I was as a DJ. I found that the two don’t always mix. Hosting new records and connecting with the audience can take away from the mix itself. 
So my idea is to create a Dj Narrative Podcast. It launched last week. Among other things like tutorials and free tracks, it aims to share a well crafted mix but with narrative and no hosting, but labelled as either down tempo (or "Coming Home") and up-tempo / dance floor (or "Going Out"). I think  hosting isn’t something that people would really want to hear more than once. It's not really suitable for listening with friends, say. So I’m hoping the narrative side and the labels will help address the different times that people listen. I like the idea of putting it out as a newsletter & podcast so there can be more related content… but I’ve only just started. 

And that’s one of the critical areas. How do you, as a host, explain an emotion, a gut feeling, a burst of energy and inspiration, without ripping the guts out of it? My thanks to Marc Reck, Karl Jones, Sam Redmore and DJ Switch for their considered and patient answers to my questioning. There’s a lot more we all talked about, and some of it may emerge in a future post.

Now, here’s some more work from each DJ…

DJ Switch

"Generally when I put together routines, they start with an idea which a) excites me and b) I feel I can get a lot out of it. Here’s an example: 

The idea was to scratch the original sample on top of the final track. The audience are grooving when the beat drops, and I'm grooving by making a new chorus riff on top of it. It's melodic, and even if you're not sure what I'm doing, you still recognise the remix element."

There's a lot more at the DJ Switch website, including gig details.


Sam Redmore
Here’s Chris Tye's recent single 'New York City Rain' as remixed by Sam:
And here's a link to Sam's breathtaking SoundCloud pages.
And here's the Freestyle blog which carries gig details and more.

Karl Jones
Here's the Brotherhood of Filth SoundCloud pages
 

Marc Reck
Marc's  website  is here, including gig details and a great blog section

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