International-Business-Times-UK-djbolivia: February 2011

STU Graffiti Party 2011

Posted by Unknown at 2:34 AM on Sunday, February 27, 2011

I played at the Graffiti party at St. Thomas University in Atlantic Canada several hours ago, and it was quite the event. I really wish that I had recorded the last couple hours of my set to post online. It really came together - some of the tightest two hours of DJ'ing that I've done in a while. Technically, almost flawless. I was pretty hyper while I was playing. In fact, I'm still bouncing around and probably won't get to sleep until lunch.

Here are track listings from the show, for those who are curious. As you can see, it was a mainstream/top40 party. I did half a dozen older hip hop tracks to get started, but moved into more upbeat tracks pretty quickly.

01. Jazzy Jeff - Parents Just Don't Understand.
02. Skee Lo - I Wish.
03. Dre & Eminem - Forget About Dre.
04. Wiz - Black & Yellow.
05. Gorillaz - Clint Eastwood.
06. BOB - Airplanes.
07. Lady Gaga - Just Dance.
08. Estelle - American Boy.
09. Ke$ha - Blah Blah Blah.
10. Usher & Pitbull - DJ Got Us Fallin' In Love.
11. Haddaway - What Is Love.
12. Katy Perry - Firework.
13. Lady Gaga - Poker Face.
14. Livvi Frank & Pitbull - Now I'm That Chick.
15. Beyonce - If I Were A Boy (Karmatronic Mix).
16. Benny Benassi - Satisfaction (Afrojack Remix).
17. Global Deejays - One Night In Bangkok (Club Mix).
18. Pussycat Dolls - When I Grow Up (Wideboys Club Mix).
19. Gnarls Barkley - Crazy (Richard Humpty Vission Mix).
20. Rihanna - Please Don't Stop The Music.
21. Rihanna - S&M (Joe Bermudez & Chico Extended Mix).
22. Katy Perry - ET (Dave Aude Club Mix).
23. Taio Cruz - Break Your Heart (Wideboys Club Mix).
24. Far East Movement - Like A G6 (Disco Fries Remix).
25. Martin Solveig & Dragonette - Hello (Club Edit).
26. Zoe Badwi - Freefallin' (Moto Blanco Club Mix).
27. ATB - Could You Believe (Original).
28. David Guetta - Who's That Chick (Martin Souza Extended Edit).
29. Rihanna - Only Girl In The World (Liam Keegan Remix).
30. Tim Berg - Seek Bromance (Samnuele Sartini Extended Mix).
31. Avicii & Sebastien Drums - My Feelings For You (Original Mix).
32. Flo Rida - Club Can't Handle Me.
33. Lady Gaga - Born This Way (Sandy Rezek vs Liam Keegan Remix).
34. Robyn - Indestructible (Laidback Luke Club Mix).
35. Ke$ha - We R Who We R (James Rendon Club Mix).
36. Swedish House Mafia - Miami 2 Ibiza.
37. Freemasons & Wynter Gordon - Believer (Club Mix).
38. Taio Cruz - Higher (Radio Edit).
39. Taio Cruz - Dynamite (Mixin Marc Club Remix).
40. Tiesto vs Diplo - C'Mon (Original Version).
41. Wolfgang Gartner - Illmerica (Extended Mix).
42. Tomcraft - Loneliness (Benny Benassi Remix).
43. Black Eyed Peas - The Time, The Dirty Bit.
44. Lady Gaga - Telephone (DJ Dan Extended Vocal Remix).
45. Pink - Raise Your Glass (Jump Smokers Extension).
46. Duck Sauce vs Deadmau5 - Barbara Needs A Ladder (Sonny D Mashup).

That last track was such a good track to end the night on. It's not an official release - just something that one of my good friends put together the other day. You can listen to it here:

YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7c8ZXgRBj0

Like I said, I wish that I had recorded the last two hours. However, I was planning to put out another top40 workout mix next week anyway, so I guess maybe I'll just do that sometime later this week. I can probably use a lot of songs that I played tonight on the next workout mix.

SHG Radio Show Episode 049

Posted by Unknown at 3:38 PM on Thursday, February 24, 2011

Welcome to this week's edition of Subterranean Homesick Grooves™, a weekly electronica-based radio show presented on CHMA FM 106.9 at Mount Allison University in Atlantic Canada. The show is normally programmed and mixed by Jonathan Clark (as DJ Bolivia), although some weeks feature guest mixes by other Canadian DJ's. The show encompasses many sub-genres within the realm of electronic dance music, but the main focus is definitely on progressive and tribal house, and a very small amount of trance & techno. Liner notes for this episode (049) can be seen below.

Para la información en español, vaya aquí.

By the way, if you're looking for DJ mixes in styles other than progressive/tech-house, check out www.djbolivia.ca/mixes.html. That page has a number of mainstream/top40 dance mixes (the "Workout Mix" series), as well as some deep house, drum and bass, and other styles.

Here's our Podcast Feed to paste into iTunes or any other podcatcher:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/shg

Older episodes of the show are not directly available from our servers anymore, to conserve space for more recent episodes. However, all older episodes have been archived permanently on SoundCloud.

Here’s a link so you can listen to the show or download it from SoundCloud:

Here are Track Listings for episode 049:

01. Komytea, "9" (Original Mix).
02. German LM, "Galactic Hours" (Alejo Gonzalez Remix).
03. Yuriy From Russia, "My Personal Flying Machine" (Original Mix).
04. Tomas Klein, "Icicles" (Robbel Remix).
05. Shai T, "Midnight Zorna" (Original Mix).
06. Deadmau5, "Alone With You" (Original Mix).
07. Lank, "Needless Solution" (Dub Mix).
08. Nick Fay, "Delighted" (Elias R Remix).
09. Foxa, "The Balance Of The Soul" (Original Mix).
10. Avicii, "Street Dancer" (Original Mix).

Follow @djbolivia
Here are links to either personal websites, MySpace pages, or SoundCloud pages for some of the original artists and remixers/producers listed above:

Komytea (Finland)
German LM (Argentina)
Alejo Gonzalez (Argentina)
Yuriy from Russia (Russia)
Tomas Klein (Germany)
Shai T (Israel)
Deadmau5 (Canada)
Lank (Hungary)
Nick Fay (Macedonia)
Elias R (United States)
Avicii (Sweden)

By the way, for those of you who didn't know, Avicii is a stage name for Tim Bergling. Yes, that is the same "Tim Berg" who produced the top40 hit "Bromance." Here's a link to the video for Bromance, even though it isn't on this mix:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChzbYiYHOUU

More information is available on our Website:
http://www.subterraneanhomesickgrooves.ca

Go to the Mix Downloads page on the main DJ Bolivia website if you'd like to check out a number of our older mixes, or visit our SoundCloud page for individual tracks and remixes.

We also have a file containing complete track listings from all of DJ Bolivia's radio shows, studio mixes, and live sets. The PDF version can be viewed from within your browser by clicking directly. Both the PDF and the Excel versions can be downloaded by right-clicking and choosing the "save link as" option:

View as PDF file: http://www.djbolivia.ca/complete_track_history_djbolivia.pdf
Download Excel file: http://www.djbolivia.ca/complete_track_history_djbolivia.xlsx

Follow Jonathan Clark on other sites:
        Twitter: twitter.com/djbolivia
        SoundCloud: soundcloud.com/djbolivia
        YouTube: youtube.com/djbolivia
        Facebook: facebook.com/djbolivia
        Main Site: www.djbolivia.ca
        Music Blog: djbolivia.blogspot.ca

Ishkur's Guide to Electronic Music

Posted by Unknown at 4:37 PM on Tuesday, February 22, 2011

I occasionally get asked what kind of music I play. My usual answer is "progressive house." But what IS progressive house? That's not something that even I understand. Luckily, there is a very tongue-in-cheek and amusing guide to electronic music on the internet which I can always point people to, namely Ishkur's Guide:

http://techno.org/electronic-music-guide

Now let me warn you in advance that although some of the info on this site is quite accurate, other sections are quite misleading. And the sarcasm level can be extreme - which I appreciate. But if you can't make occasional fun of your own musical tastes, then there is something wrong.

Let's look at the definition of "progressive house" to get started:

Alright, this progressive nonsense has to stop. You do not make yourself intelligent and creative by using that word. Instead, you make yourself out to be haughty and pretentious. This makes you no better than the French. This goes for progressive house, progressive rock, progressive trance ... kill the word already, it means nothing...

When you go to the main page of the site, you'll see seven main genre categories on the top left. You'll be able to explore things like:

  Jungle: The black sheep of electronic music ...
  House: The world's perennial party music ...
  Techno: The depressing, gritty, dystopian genre ...
  Hardcore: The musical genre with bi-polar order ...

Once you get into any of those seven main categories, you'll see dozens of sub-genres mapped out, each with their own description and samples of that kind of music.

I guess some DJ's and producers might be offended by some of the descriptions in the guide, but underneath the sarcasm, you'll find some good info. It wouldn't be hard to spend a couple hours on the site, "broadening your musical knowledge."

Enjoy ...

Nuthin' But a G Thang Remix

Posted by Unknown at 5:22 AM on Monday, February 21, 2011

This past summer, one of the projects that I did for one of my classes at Berklee was a remix of Dre's classic hip hop track, "Nuthin' But a G Thang." At the time, I did the entire project in Reason. This weekend, I was listening to the original, so yesterday afternoon I decided to dig out my project and start fresh, by re-building it from scratch in Ableton (with some major changes), just for practice. Here's the result:

Dr Dre feat Snoop - Nuthin' But a G Thang (Bolivia's Beats) by djbolivia

YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utsdZ0x4yK0

The original was released in 1993 and is pretty well known. It reached #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts that year, and VH1 listed it as number 3 on the top 100 hip hop tracks of all time, just a year or so ago. It's also included in Rolling Stone's "forty tracks that changed the world" list.

The project is certainly not perfect. Unfortunately, I couldn't get a clean original acapella, so the one I used has some obvious artifacts, such as the female vocal harmonies that pop up occasionally, and some extra light percussion. I also mangled the layout slightly - the song is set up as eight-bar sections and I didn't tie the verses to those sections accurately for the first third of the song, just because I was playing around with things. I kind of wish that I had access to the original clean vocals so I could do this properly, but I don't know how I'd find those, short of asking Dre for the original vocal files.

On a positive note, I tried to keep this extremely simple, so the project only uses audio loops that are included in the Live Pack, and no external VST's or VSTi's. Ableton doesn't have good brass sounds, so I created the horn section in Reason and exported it as an audio loop, to make sure that anyone with Ableton can see how everything works in this remix with no missing pieces. Even Reason isn't great - I would have rather played the horns live if I had a trumpet and trombone here at the studio. And there are several shortcomings, such as generic reverbs instead of tailoring them to instruments, lack of global grooves, etc., which I was ignoring because I was trying to "speed produce." But whatever. You've got to stop somewhere. If you're going to be a professional at this someday, you'd better get used to the dichotomy between deadlines versus enhancing artistic creativity.

There is practically no automation in this project aside from volume automation the arrangement view. The only exception is a bit of automation of the wet/dry on the ping pong on the keys. No filters anywhere. My general view is that if you need effects to make your productions sound good, you need to work on your basics more. It's like DJ'ing - no matter how much technical prowess you have, 90% of the job is programming (playing good tracks). So with this project, I tried to make it sound decent in a "quick and dirty" session, without obsessing about effects.

By the way, the school course that I took this for was the Hip Hop Production course at Berklee, taught by Michael Hamilton. I really learned a lot from this course, especially since I'm not as familiar with hip hop as I am with some other genres. And Michael was a great prof - if you read his bio, you'll see that he has an incredible amount of experience in the genre (and he's worked with Dre and Snoop and Warren G, among many other producers.

Anyway, like I say, this is just an educational project for me, but it was fun to play with yesterday. Repost if you like it though. Here's a link to the original video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gK1e2TCFAA

SHG Radio Show Episode 048

Posted by Unknown at 5:20 PM on Thursday, February 17, 2011

Welcome to this week's edition of Subterranean Homesick Grooves™, a weekly electronica-based radio show presented on CHMA FM 106.9 at Mount Allison University in Atlantic Canada. The show is normally programmed and mixed by Jonathan Clark (as DJ Bolivia), although some weeks feature guest mixes by other Canadian DJ's. The show encompasses many sub-genres within the realm of electronic dance music, but the main focus is definitely on progressive and tribal house, and a very small amount of trance & techno. Liner notes for this episode (048) can be seen below.

Para la información en español, vaya aquí.

By the way, if you're looking for DJ mixes in styles other than progressive/tech-house, check out www.djbolivia.ca/mixes.html. That page has a number of mainstream/top40 dance mixes (the "Workout Mix" series), as well as some deep house, drum and bass, and other styles.

Here's our Podcast Feed to paste into iTunes or any other podcatcher:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/shg

Older episodes of the show are not directly available from our servers anymore, to conserve space for more recent episodes. However, all older episodes have been archived permanently on SoundCloud.

Here’s a link so you can listen to the show or download it from SoundCloud:

Here are Track Listings for episode 048:

01. DJ Kypski, "Satisfaction" (Kuhlmann Remix).
02. Jay Lumen, "Playground" (Original Mix).
03. DJ Camero, "Buffalo" (Carlos Chaparro Remix).
04. Martin Escape, "My Search" (Original Mix).
05. John Acquaviva & Olivier Giacomotto, "Black Mamba" (Original Mix).
06. Ivan Wasquez, "Eleven" (Original Mix).
07. Niaz Arca, "Back To The Jungle" (Original Mix).
08. Supernova, "Beat Me Back" (Original Mix).
09. Soundshaperz, "Cocaine" (Original Mix).
10. Nick Fay, "After Midnight" (Original Mix).

Follow @djbolivia
Kypski is a Dutch DJ and producer who is interesting because he's also a scratch DJ. You don't see that a lot among house producers. His SoundCloud page has a full bio.

Jay Lumen, from Hungary, is a very well-known name. It's amazing that he has any time to produce with his pretty full international touring schedule.

DJ Camero is very involved in the electronic music scene within Spain.

John Acquaviva is one of Canada's best. Surprisingly, I feel like he is more appreciated outside of Canada than he is here, for his extensive accomplishments in the world of techno. Don't get me wrong - he is definitely well known within Canada, but when people from other countries think of electronica DJ's, he would be at the top of the list, along with names like Richie Hawtin & Max Graham & Deadmau5.

Soundshaperz is a name you might not recognize, because it's only been used a few times. It's a collaboration (a tech-progressive alias) between Dutch DJ's & producers Ummet Ozcan and M.E.M.

Nick Fay doesn't have a very well-known SoundCloud page, but I've seen his name several times in the past few weeks for some reason. Nick is from Macedonia. That's about all that I know about him.

Here's a video link for Supernova's "Beat Me Back" track:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcZ8kpLVhwg

More information is available on our Website:
http://www.subterraneanhomesickgrooves.ca

Go to the Mix Downloads page on the main DJ Bolivia website if you'd like to check out a number of our older mixes, or visit our SoundCloud page for individual tracks and remixes.

We also have a file containing complete track listings from all of DJ Bolivia's radio shows, studio mixes, and live sets. The PDF version can be viewed from within your browser by clicking directly. Both the PDF and the Excel versions can be downloaded by right-clicking and choosing the "save link as" option:

View as PDF file: http://www.djbolivia.ca/complete_track_history_djbolivia.pdf
Download Excel file: http://www.djbolivia.ca/complete_track_history_djbolivia.xlsx

Show at Triangles in Moncton, February 11th

Posted by Unknown at 12:45 AM on Saturday, February 12, 2011

Tonight was a great night. Much better than I had expected. I got an ear infection on Wednesday and I was a little nervous that I wouldn't be able to hear very well for tonight's show, but it cleared up quickly with an overdose of antibiotics. Happy birthday to my friend Emily! And Nick, it was great to see you again.

The only real drawback of the night was that I intended to play a full set of tribal and progressive house, but because I was switching tracks too quickly, I was running out of music by the end of the night (I was the only DJ for the evening). It should not be possible to have thirty-seven progressive/house tracks take less than three hours, but I guess that I did edit everything earlier this afternoon and cut out all of the breakdowns, making all the tracks shorter. Anyway, I was getting a few requests for some top40 near the end of the night, so I actually decided to switch gears and move into top40 for the last twenty minutes, rather than playing some shitty progressive tracks that I had panned earlier in the evening. Here's the set list:

01. DJ Kypski - Satisfaction (Kuhlmann Remix).
02. John Acquaviva & Olivier Giacomotto - Black Mamba (Original Mix).
03. Manuel De La Mare & Luigi Rocca - Tam Tam (Original Mix).
04. Dezza - Foul (Original Mix).
05. DJ Camero - Buffalo (Carlos Chaparro Remix).
06. Martin Escape - My Search (Original Mix).
07. Bingo Players - Get On The Move (Alex Kenji Remix).
08. D Deluxer - Between Time And Space (Iliyan Mix).
09. Gabriel Rocha - Ride On Time (Original Club Mix).
10. Francis Preve - Jetsam (Original Mix).
11. Ivan Wasquez - Eleven (Original Mix).
12. Pako & Frederik - Etnosat (TC Maniak).
13. Compact Grey & Beatamines - El Fantastico (Dub Mix).
14. Soundshaperz - Cocaine (Original Mix).
15. Ralph Gar - Take Me (Play Tech Mix).
16. Oliver Schmitz - Multiplexing (Original Mix).
17. Rah Band - Clouds Across The Moon (Jay Lumen Lost The Connection Remix).
18. Ludowick - My Own Reality (Nemaier Remix).
19. Lee & Slater - First Date (Original Mix).
20. Jay Lumen - Playground (Original Mix).
21. DJ Slider & Anton Liss - Mr Devil (David Jones Remix).
22. Nick Fay - After Midnight (Original Mix).
23. Niaz Arca - Back To The Jungle (Original Mix).
24. 21 Street - Dream Away (Original Mix).
25. Hard Rock Sofa & Saint Brothers - Blow Up (Thomas Gold vs Axwell Remix).
26. Supernova - Beat Me Back (Original Mix).
27. Hanz Koenig - Waveform (Original Mix).
28. Miguel Vargas - I Love The Sound (Original Mix).
29. Old Young Guy - Toyg (Manuel De La Mare Edit).
30. Saints & Sinners - Pushin Too Hard (Nic Fanciulli Remix).
31. DJ Dan - N2O (DJ Dan's Bongoloid Mix).
32. Carl Roda & Marc Fisher - Zora (Original Mix).
33. Stefano Noferini - Move Your Body (Original Mix).
34. Avicii - Street Dancer (Original Mix).
35. Crazibiza - My Lips (Original Mix).
36. Stars On 45 - Stars On 45 (Olav Basoski Remix).
37. Black Project - Rasputin (Simioli & Black Original Mix).

At this point, I was running out of music because I was switching between tracks a bit too fast, so I ended up digging into the mainstream crate. The dance floor loved it, but that wasn't my intention at the start of the night. Anyway, I'm not going to list those because there were only a few and I can't remember exactly what I played, maybe "Tetris" by Electrixx, "The Time/Dirty Bit" by BEP, "Dynamite" by Taio Cruz, "Raise Your Glass" by Pink, and "C'mon" by Tiesto/Diplo. First time I've ever played a Tiesto track in a live set, I think. I feel like there might have been one or two more tracks in there, but I can't remember.

I finished the night with "Sprawl 2 (Mountains Beyond Mountains)" by the Arcade Fire.

Sorry, but I didn't record this set. However, I do have a photo that Ian Allen (my sound tech and all-around support staff) took while I was DJ'ing. As usual, I'm screaming out the lyrics to a song, from the looks of things. Not that I usually play songs with a lot of lyrics, but when I do, I can usually count on coming home with no voice:

Triangles is located at 234 St. George Street in Moncton, New Brunswick, Canada. Big thanks to Stella & Nadine and the rest of the staff for such a warm welcome, as always ...

SHG Radio Show Episode 047

Posted by Unknown at 3:05 PM on Thursday, February 10, 2011

Welcome to this week's edition of Subterranean Homesick Grooves™, a weekly electronica-based radio show presented on CHMA FM 106.9 at Mount Allison University in Atlantic Canada. The show is normally programmed and mixed by Jonathan Clark (as DJ Bolivia), although some weeks feature guest mixes by other Canadian DJ's. The show encompasses many sub-genres within the realm of electronic dance music, but the main focus is definitely on progressive and tribal house, and a very small amount of trance & techno. Liner notes for this episode (047) can be seen below.

Para la información en español, vaya aquí.

By the way, if you're looking for DJ mixes in styles other than progressive/tech-house, check out www.djbolivia.ca/mixes.html. That page has a number of mainstream/top40 dance mixes (the "Workout Mix" series), as well as some deep house, drum and bass, and other styles.

Bolivia - Global Underground (DJ Nard Instrumental) by djbolivia

One notable thing about this week's show is that I finally feel like the radio show is getting a sense of direction. For the first thirty episodes, I experimented with a few different styles. The show was progressive house more often than not, but there was also a bit of trance, some electro, and some mainstream. There were a dozen great guest mixes too. In fact, if I had to make a top10 list of episodes to date, half of them would be guest mixes! But the end result was that there wasn't a lot of consistency. However, for the last few shows (with the exception of #045, which was the last time I'll be playing mainstream/top40 on Subterranean Homesick Grooves), I've finally felt like I've found the style I want: Progressive and tech-house. Very few vocals. Nothing bouncy or mainstream. The kind of music that most people know me for playing from the first several years that I had my main website online (except even fewer vocals than I used in mixes from 2003-2006). So that's what you can expect from the show from this point forward.

Also, now that I've spent the past six months trying to "catch up" on a lot of projects that I should have completed in the past three years, I feel like I finally have more free time. I've got a couple of big projects that are going to wrap up this weekend, and next week is going to be a "new start" for me. I'll be doing a lot more of my own production work, and I've also made arrangements to collaborate with a couple of other Atlantic Canadian producers. Finally, starting next week, I'm going to be spending a bit more time on the write-ups for each radio show, giving readers a bit of background about some of the artists & producers/remixers featured in each episode.

For people in southern New Brunswick, I'll be playing a progressive house set from 11pm to 2am on Friday, February 11th, at Triangles on St. George Street in Moncton. I hope to see a lot of familiar faces there. Enjoy this week's radio show!

More information is available on our Website:
http://www.subterraneanhomesickgrooves.ca

Go to the Mix Downloads page on the main DJ Bolivia website if you'd like to check out a number of our older mixes, or visit our SoundCloud page for individual tracks and remixes.

We also have a file containing complete track listings from all of DJ Bolivia's radio shows, studio mixes, and live sets. The PDF version can be viewed from within your browser by clicking directly. Both the PDF and the Excel versions can be downloaded by right-clicking and choosing the "save link as" option:

View as PDF file: http://www.djbolivia.ca/complete_track_history_djbolivia.pdf
Download Excel file: http://www.djbolivia.ca/complete_track_history_djbolivia.xlsx

SHG Radio Show Episode 046

Posted by Unknown at 1:54 PM on Thursday, February 3, 2011

Welcome to this week's edition of Subterranean Homesick Grooves™, a weekly electronica-based radio show presented on CHMA FM 106.9 at Mount Allison University in Atlantic Canada. The show is normally programmed and mixed by Jonathan Clark (as DJ Bolivia), although some weeks feature guest mixes by other Canadian DJ's. The show encompasses many sub-genres within the realm of electronic dance music, but the main focus is on progressive and tribal house, and a bit of trance & techno. Liner notes for this episode (046) can be seen below.

Para la información en español, vaya aquí.

By the way, if you're looking for DJ mixes in styles other than progressive/tech-house, check out www.djbolivia.ca/mixes.html. That page has a number of mainstream/top40 dance mixes (the "Workout Mix" series), as well as some deep house, drum and bass, and other styles.

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