Posted by: Jay

*Español abajo*

Well folks, after a year year of living down here I’m on my way out of Bolivia. After some travels to Argentina and Brazil I’ll be back in the Bay around mid August. I just can not believe a year has gone by already, they just seem to fly by these days. And maybe not coincidentally this year has been chalk full of fantastic new experiences: new language, new food, new friends, new culture, a new love, new job, and maybe most relevant here, new music.

In “Bolivi’n It Up”* I tried to combine the music I’ve been playing down here, more easily accessible edm and pop-remixes, with the general vibe of living in La Paz: fast paced, energetic, a bit dirty and a lot of fun! We start of in a Bolivian bus station and just let the vibe flow from there. I thinks it’s a healthy fusion of styles, not veering too far into pop nor too deep into hard electro, and many of the tracks are pulled straight from my sets over the past year.

* Mad props out to my homie Bun Chan in Japan for inspiring that title. When are we gonna get you on the podcast Bun Chan??

If you enjoy the set half as much as I’ve enjoyed living in Bolivia I’ll have done something rite. Thanks for listening, and all my peoples in the Bay, I’ll see you soon!

DJ Jay - “Bolivi’n It Up!” (hacer click de derecho por guardar / right click and “Save as…” to download”)

Bueno amigos y amigas, me estoy yendo de Bolivia este fin de mes, después de haber estado por un año. No puedo creer que el tiempo hay pasado tan rápido! Tal vez una de las razones es es que ese año ha estado lleno de nuevas experiencias fantásticas: nuevo idioma, nueva comida, nuevos amigos, nuevo amor, nueva cultura, nuevo trabajo y nueva música también.

En “Bolivi’n It Up” he tratado de combinar música que he estado tocando aqui, sobretodo pox-remixes, con el ambiente general de vivir en La Paz: Ritmo rápido, energético, un poco sucio y muy divertido! Empezamos con en una estación de micros de bolivianos y dejamos que fluja el ambiente de ahí. Yo creoque es una fución saludable de estilos, no muy pop, no muy hard electro y muchas de las canciones son de mis sets de el último año.

Muchas gracias a todos mis amigos que colaboraron para que este año en Bolivia sea maravilloso; voy a extrañar Bolivia y a todos ustedes! Disfruten de esta mezcla!

Tracklist & photos / los conciones y fotos:
Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by: Jay

I’ve always loved the desert, especially the American Southwest.  From afar, as in the photo above, it appears a desolate wasteland.  Boring, harsh, scorched earth where nothing would dare to live.  But when you get closer and take the time to really get to know the place you will be amazed by the subtle beauty, the persistence of life, the colors, the smells, and the sounds.  The stars shine brighter, the sunsets more colorful, the storms more dramatic, and the pockets of green more vibrant.

This mix is a bit like a trip though the Southwest.  It’s unapologetic progressive house and trance; long songs filled with subtle beauty that only reveal themselves upon closer examination.  Not surprisingly I actually made this tape specifically for a camping trip I was taking to southern Utah, New Mexico and Arizona with my good friends Dustin and Gavin back in the day.  It was never an “Official Entropy Release” so there’s a few tracks that I repeated on other sets, but on the flip side it has some real gems that otherwise would have been lost to time.

Some time when you’re chillin throw this puppy on and bliss out.  Or put it in the rotation for your next road trip.  Like Sasha’s Camden Palace tape it’s not gonna blow you away on first listen, but for those who appreciate understated changes, good mixes and classic progressive house & trance I trust you will appreciate the sweet, subtle sounds of the desert.  Enjoy!

DJ Jay - “Sounds of the Desert” - Side A (right click and “Save as…” to download)

DJ Jay - “Sounds of the Desert” - Side B (It’s here, finally!  Right click and “Save as…” to download. download postponed due to internet wackness in Bolivia.  I’ll have it for you soon)

Track list and more after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by: Jay

Super-awesome cover art by my new Bolivian gf Paola Lambertin (who I think will be personally offended if Daft Punk doesnt win this).

So I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not but we’re doing this little contest here at The Beatery trying to find the best producers of electronic dance music of the 2000s. Somewhere along the way (I think it was at Tiesto of all people…) it dawned on me that: fuck, I should really do a podcast with these Dons of Dance, these Behemoths of Beats, these Saints of Synths* all mixed together!

*Thank you, thank you, I’m here all night.

So I came up with some quick rules for this “So You Think You Can Bump” podcast:

1. Every contestant would get one, and only one song.
2. I would not be trying to include everyone’s “biggest” or “most memorable” or “definitive” track. Way too hard to put together anything with flow, and quite frankly, I’m sick to death of most of those*
3. I would not use a track (or the same mix of a track) that was ever on any of our sets. These guys are so prolific let’s hear some new stuff**
4. Any mix, re-mix, cover or mashup was fair game as long as the SYTYCB artist was somehow associated

* This is not to say I COULDN’T use one of these, it just wasn’t the priority.

** Like every good set of rules one of them needs to get broken, and for me it was number three. I used one track that appears elsewhere in a mix on this site. Can you catch it? It’s pretty obvious…

So with these rules in hand and 15 holes to fill I felt like the manager of and All Star game. Who do I start? When do I use the heavy hitters? With so many of these guys being multi-dynamic producers, what style should I have them represent? With so many different styles how do I get them to gel together?

Well, the need for flow made most of these decisions pretty easy. And now that the dust has settled I have to say I’m pretty excited about this mix! It’s not often that you have an excuse to only use the best producers in you set, and wow, what a result.

I hope you enjoy listening to this as much as I did making it! It’ll be a nice way to look back at an incredible period of dance music:

DJ Jay – “Barons Of Bump”

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by: Cor

Mwahahahaha! Halloween is finally upon us, and to celebrate we present you with the second in our series of spooky retro mixes: a super-rare versus set Jay and I recorded for a Halloween party way back in… damn, when was this? Judging from the tracks I’d say this was in 2000, but it’s hard to know for sure; I barely remember recording this one. Big thanks to Dustin for getting this to me, as he had what appears to be the only copy of this long-forgotten CD. Even Jay and I haven’t heard this in years.

Listening back now, Jay’s set definitely sounds a lot more Halloween-y than mine, I love the dramatic cello-driven trance tracks and the Psycho theme in there. His set has better flow and mixing as well… You know, on second thought, don’t listen to my set. Maybe I forgot this CD on purpose. Ah hell, it’s too late now, it’s out there, for better or worse. Trick or treat, you decide.

Paradox - Bump in the Night

DJ Cor - Bump in the Night

Posted by: Jay

You hum… you excite… you arc and spark.  You are invisible to the human eye, yet you help it see the most microscopic of objects.  You can be a solid particle or an undefined probabilistic wave, depending on your mood.  You can be spun 360 degrees, only to show a new side of yourself.  People are always calling you negative, but you know it’s all relative.  You kick it with other sub-atomic particles, but you know you are better, stronger, faster… and a whole lot smaller.   You yearn to break out of your nuclear home, to flow free, to carry information, to change the world.  And you never… stop… moving…

For our 100th post on The Beatery I invite you into the world of the electron, and all they wonders it makes possible.  From the neurons in our brains, to the intricate workings of modern technology, we owe much of our existence to these sub-atomic marvels.  Step inside the stream and who knows where you’ll end up…

DJ Jay - Electron Flow (Right click and “Save as…” to download)

Tracklist, movies sampled and more after the jump, but don’t forget you can get your own personal flow of electrons to your computer every other week by subscribing to our podcast.  Enjoy!

Read the rest of this entry »