Thursday, March 08, 2007

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DJ VERSE aka LAUREN WHEELER aka FIGHTING WORDS

This set was inspired by several things. To begin with, I squeezed myself into a guest spot at Fail Safe, a bimonthly ambient/drone/trip hop/electro/what-have-you night started by Yosh! and Kiechle at Julie's Supper Club in San Francisco. According to Wikipedia, a fail safe is "a device which, if (or when) it fails, fails in a way that will cause no harm or at least a minimum of harm to other devices or danger to personnel." It may also be described as "an operation which ensures that a failure of equipment, process, or system does not propagate beyond the immediate environs of the failing entity."

Seeing as how this was the first time in three years I'd played records beyond the immediate environs of my bedroom, and seeing as how I was primarily a house deejay playing at a venue whose audience I know mostly from the industrial and goth scene, I felt a certain tension to play music that I wouldn't normally bring out to a club simply to appease the masses. However, this was a fail safe. I could play what I wanted with minimal harm, though deejaying in and of itself is a matter of propagating a process beyond one's immediate environs, i.e. the jukebox that lives in my head. I needed to be honest, and fearless.

And so, this is part of my creative process--my emotional and intellectual interior leads to a particular engagement with my surroundings. These must mesh before I attempt to beat-match or write a poem or sing a note. It's not peace I'm looking for as the precursor to making art, but a certain synchronicity. Art is neither consumed nor created in a vacuum.

This mix contains old favorites of mine as well as a couple of tracks I discovered on Rayna's blog; it includes songs that were always "too slow" to play at house parties and songs that are simply not house. At its beginning and at its end, it speaks to a state of mind (and heart) that has been very real to me lately: vulnerability, a lack of defenses, a willingness to take risks. This heart, this mind, are united with a body demanding motion, wanting to move, move, move.


01. RJD2 - Here's What's Left

02. Everyday People - I Can't Sleep (Afronaught Main Mix)

03. Alex Gopher - The Child (Kenny Dope Radio Edit)

04. Rithma - The New Simple (Joshua's Main Mix)

05. Brett Johnson - You + Me = We

06. Trentemoller - Always Something Better (Trentemoller Dub Remix)

07. Brancaccio & Aisher - Everybody (Original Mix)

08. MAW Electronic - Tranz

09. Snax - Immer So (Kaos Re-dub)

10. Marlow - Exposed

11. Marques Wyatt - For Those Who Like to Get Down

12. Tommy Moye & Bryan Tyson - High Time

13. Jay J & Chris Lum - Freaks Like Us (Original Mix)

14. Paul Jackson - Bulldozer

15. King Kooba - Fooling Myself (Attack of the 50 Foot Kooba From Mars Mix)

16. Amphibian feat. Natalie Elizabeth Gay - Empty (Marlow's Five, Four, Three Version)

5 Comments:

Blogger eric cloutier said...

as a frequent stalker of your blog, i must finally say "thank you" to you for your gracious donations to the musical community. i've been a dj for 11yrs, and keeping up with all the music is just a chore. working for turntable.lab enlightens me to more and more tunage, but there's so much that is oft-overlooked.

therefor i delcare you to be the best performer for internet awesomeness in the year 2007. i know its only march, but damn...you always bring me the nicest treats.

i'd kill to make out with your mp3 collection. its gotta be retarded good.

eric cloutier | less is more homepage

ps. if you have a myspace, oh how i'd long to stumble upon it.

3:52 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

M.A.D.

3:53 PM  
Blogger ForwardEver said...

DJ Verse– great selection and explanation of this set. You have a very humble and down-to-earth air about things, which is true of most DJs I respect. I hope you get to play more of these sets out soon. The head-jukebox is a wonderful space, no?

P.S. Thank you Modyfier.

11:13 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Thank you, ForwardEver, for the kind words. The head-jukebox is one of my favorite places. Kudos to Modyfier for contributing so much to it.

9:49 PM  
Blogger Joel Dubiner said...

Broken download link -- modyfier, can you update the link? Thanks!

1:15 PM  

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