The semester is winding down quickly, which means lots of insanity on my part and explains our relative quiet of late. Last weekend we celebrated my man Tony’s last free time before joining the navy. Friday night, myself, Chris Schubert, Tony, and Brother Mike rocked out the Alto Lounge, bringing back memories of the golden days of Club Havana. Highlights for me were when Tony dropped the Police’s “When The World Is Running Down, You Make The Best Of Whats Still Around” (off of the “Zenyatta Mondatta” LP, I’m currently on the hunt for the 12″…) and Chris playing a cut from the gorgeous “3” album by Tread. On Sunday, Tony’s family had all of his friends over for one last get together which my wife summed up quite succinctly, I won’t try to better her on that one.

This upcoming weekend I am heading to Detroit for some writing business. If all goes well, I will have some good new material for ISM in addition to the piece that got me up there in the first place, which should be a good one. I’m looking forward to chilling with my 313 crew and record shopping and all that, being in Detroit is just so much fun. I’m thinking about checking out Todd Sines, Brian Gillespie, and Todd Osborne on Friday night at Oslo, which is one of my favorite clubs.

Onto more ISMy things, we have a new mix by my man in SF Mikebee entitled “Presque Vu”. Mikebee works at the vinyl haven Amoeba Records on Haight St. (where he is a dance music buyer) which you REALLY must check out if you’re a music head. He was recently profiled in SF Weekly which gives his whole history going back to his 412 days. Bonus: check out Mike (a trained opera singer!) belting out Neneh Cherry’s classic “Buffalo Stance” complete with dance moves. This is what karaoke is meant to be! Mikebee: truly a renaissance man.

I also got a couple more new records in the mail, most impressive being the new Osborne 12″ on Spectral and the new Recloose 12″ “Maui’s Lament” on Rush Hour. The Osborne is really nice old school flavored house, very Chicago influenced. One of the cuts is a really sweet deep jam that will definitely be making an appearance in one of my mixes very shortly. The Recloose is a bit of a return to his earlier tracks that were less song-based. “Maui’s Lament” is all about the contrast between the deep bassline and the shimmering pads, you might be seeing that one in a mix very soon as well! Top quality jams!