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Short Hiatus

I was out of town, in the Bay Area, last week. I am back, and listening to some cool remixes of Depeche Mode tracks. Good stuff.

I did not get to the Sub Swara show. It was a matter of financial consideration, because a taxi from The Fillmore to Burlingame would have paid for a steak dinner for two at Ruth’s Chris. I’ll see them, someday.

Surprising lack of new music this week, though it’s hardly a drought. I might not be as behind as I feared.

Tune in Thursday!

Stuff

I’ve spent some time over the past month and a half figuring out which records, and tracks thereupon, to play at the wedding for a coworker. Small affair, with 20-22 people, and Jazz was the requested format. No problem, got it covered. Just wish I’d remembered where I put that single RCA barrel connector to eliminate the $4 and 25 minutes spent getting two MORE of those damned things.

The wedding went very well. Some Yo-Yo Ma and stuff, from the iPad using djay, for the ceremony itself, then right into some Ahmad Jamal and Miles Davis. Many hours, many records, and only one frantic session trying to find dancing music later, I wrapped things up with some 20s and 30s territory band stuff. Great fun was had by all, including me.

On a different note, my ESL Music haul arrived today. Some Ancient Astronauts, Kabanjak, Federico Aubele, and Thievery Corporation vinyl to add to the collection. Man, I’m looking forward to playing some of these at Def Con if possible.

Speaking of…I submitted an application to preform during Def Con 19 this year. The hardest work was putting together the tracks I knew I wanted. The music was easy, as I’ve had a ton of new and recent releases whose sound is just begging to be heard loud and clear by an audience. A mix was required, so I put it together. It’s available below for your pleasure:

Def Con 19 Demo by Nerd Show

XLR8R 195 – Shigeto

This guy is one of my favorite artists over the last 18 months. His release, Full Circle, stuck around on the Nerd Show playlist for months. The follow-up remix album was just recently bumped off the list, but there’s always something more around the corner. He drops a mix for the XLR8R Podcast and you should listen in:

ESL Music sale

I caught a fortunate tweet by ESL Music on Twitter, @ESLmusicDC, that they were having a spring sale. Most notably there were very good deals on vinyl, which I’m a big fan of.

Shop ESL Music

I took the opportunity to pick up a handful of singles and an album. Very excited to play these:

Ancient Astronauts – Into Bass and Time 2xLP
Ancient Astronauts – Rhythm EP
Federico Aubele – Postales
Thievery Corporation – The Time We Lost Our Way EP
Kabanjak – Put Em Up EP

Less than $20!

Gold Panda – NPR

An interesting interview with one of my favorite artists, Gold Panda:

When I first encountered the music of British producer Gold Panda on an episode of All Songs Considered, I loved what I heard. However, I had little to no idea what I was hearing or where the sounds came from. When it comes to electronic music, that can be a barrier to entry for some listeners. Without the usual visual cues of traditional Western music (a guitarist strumming a chord, say), it can be a challenge to think of the person behind a laptop pushing various buttons and turning assorted knobs as a “musician.”

See the full interview HERE

Not enough time…

In the past I’ve sometimes had a hard time filling a three-hour show with music. Adding a turntable helped, but then I started to hit a crunch point where it was hard to split the show between the two, so I went to a 2/1 split, with 2/3rds of the music being new, digital stuff, while the balance of the show was from the Technics. I haven’t had the turntable in since before the new year and, if I’m honest, I feel bad about that.

That being said, I’m getting what seems like an increasing amount of music. Perhaps the “break” of SXSW makes the last few weeks seem overflowing, but I’m almost done listening to 147 tracks for the show tonight. 147. I can’t really play even 40 on the show, and I do play tracks from weeks and even months past, if they’re that good.

I have been making requests to friends with the message that I want to play in the club they work at, or asking them to inquire among their associates about any possibilities of doing a show on another station as well. I almost feel like I need to do a second show in order to let this music be heard.

Is it weird that the weight of this music can be a burden?

Sure is fun though…