Following on from Tom, I’m gonna try and break off smaller, more frequent reviews instead of compiling lengthy posts that take forever to do. While in theory this will mean I’ll be a little bit fresher with the material, not so in this case. Ah well.

Optic Nerve – 3 Dimensional Ep (Diametric)

I got a heads up to this record a while back but I only got around to picking up a copy of it today, hence the lateness – it came out during the summer. Either way, it demands some attention, even now. Optic Nerve is one of the aliases of Keith Tucker and on this release he delivers some super deep electro/techno. It kicks off at breakneck pace with Virtual Depth Perception (Vocal) that even at -8 I’d probably struggle to fit in to a set, but it’s a pretty solid, if not groundbreaking piece of deep Detroit electro the likes of which Tucker has touched on many times before. For me the release steps up a gear with the following Illusionist Theme which goes a little bit deeper. Great pitch bending synths lead the way over a classic 313 pad pattern before some loose snare work outs shake  up the backbone of the track, turning it into a spine-tingling break beat motherfucker of  a track. I can’t wait to play this one out!

Retina Display Scan keeps up the futuristic sci-fi feel of the flip but again goes deeper still, taking a more abstract route through the type of electro Gerard Hanson delivers with his ERP alias, keeping it on a beatless tip for the most part, with Tucker infusing it with his own style at all times. He teases us at the very end with a rubberband bassline and sturdy kick, which comes to an end far too soon. The ep is rounded of with a few tiny snippets of loops that could be used to nice effect in a set if they weren’t so short. In a way the b-side is slightly frustrating in terms of how much you could use them when playing out but the A2 especially is just so good, I’ll forgive him for this.

Floorplan – Sanctified Ep

Rob Hood’s latest ep under his disco/house inspired Floorplan moniker is a 12 that has gotten a lot of coverage elsewhere in the last couple of months but I thought I’d give it a shout out too. While the B-side delivers some excellent straight up Hood action – especially the rush-inducing Baby, Baby, which reminds me quite a bit of the storming School cut from his Hood Music series a few years back – it’s We Sanctify His Name on the A that I find the most intriguing. Musically it’s a belter of a track and one sure to ignite some full on dancefloor nuttiness, but I’m interested to hear what readers have to say about the lyrical content of the song. Hood is, of course, one of the most outspoken religious peeps in the techno fraternity and while he often talks about the influence God plays in all aspects of his music this is his most blatant statement yet, within an actual cut.

The question is, do people feel uncomfortable playing a record that is an obvious religious statement? I don’t think you are gonna find many Djs with such a religious devotion as Hood who feel like this record is “speaking” for them. I put it to Twitter folk when the record came out and some admitted that they’d feel uncomfortable playing it. This also reminded me of another Twitter discussion from months ago where myself and Tom clogged up everyones feed argueing about how; as a Dj, can we play certain songs due to their lyrical content, be it religious pieces like this, overtly gay songs written for that crowd or songs with a heavily racial bent? Should they be played to Secular/Straight crowds etc, or do we even bother taking any of this into account and just worry about how much they get the floor moving…and do the dancers out there care at all?

If you look on the “Categories” sidebar, you’ll see “DEMF 08″, “DEMF 09″, and “DEMF 10″. Before those years when I covered DEMF for this blog, I attended every year from 03 on. Barring a drastic change in how the festival operates, that will be it for me moving into the future. I will still be going to Detroit this weekend: I’ll be supporting parties with Detroit deejays playing at them, I’ll be eating food at Detroit restaurants, I’ll be supporting Detroit record stores, I’ll be picking up freshly pressed records from a Detroit record pressing plant, and I will in general be giving my money to businesses and people in Detroit. But not Paxahau.

My beef with these guys is pretty long-standing at this point. I’m not going to rehash every single qualm I’ve had with their running of the festival over the years, but the last straws were last year when stagehands were prepping shit DIRECTLY IN FRONT of the Moritz Von Oswald Trio during their set and when the Detroit artists were once again relegated to the underground stage where sound and air quality are just not up to par. I’ve had enough.

There has been an argument that I’ve heard some people make for many years, the gist of it being that the festival is NOT about Detroit music, that it is only an electronic music festival taking place there. Looking back at the lineups from the jump-off through to 2005 or so, I couldn’t agree with that assessment. If you take into account the lineups from 06-11, I now wholeheartedly AGREE with that point of view. I am not interested in going to some generic music festival just because it is in Detroit. Especially when the results are more like a crappy rave than anything else! I loved the festival because it used to be a celebration of Detroit music and culture. It has ceased being that, and I have spent more time sitting around being irritated at the low quality of the music and the hassle of leaving and re-entering if I want to avoid paying crazy money for crappy festival food.

My mind used to be blown regularly at the festival; that experience has been declining precipitously every year. It’s not just me, either. My man Matt Cohen has a few words about his experiences photographing (for RA, XLR8R, and here!) and attending the festival that you can read here. Less and less of my people from all over the world have been attending the festival, including the dwindling Pittsburgh crew. It’s sad to see it all go downhill like this, but that’s what happens when the people in charge of the festival are more interested in being cool promoter guys than in the legacy of Detroit’s music. Carl Craig’s continuing association with them is yet another blemish on his already pockmarked recent track record. I hope that that money is awesome for all involved.

I do truly hope that this weekend remains a time when techno and house people worldwide can get together in the Midwest and hang out, even if it is primarily at afterparties instead of the festival itself. I can’t even imagine how much shit has come into being as a direct result of the connections made on Memorial Day weekend every year. I know it has been wildly helpful for me and many of my friends who deejay, play live, own labels, put out music, etc. Having this die off would be even worse than the demise of the festival itself!

Many people have been asking me which afterparties I will be attending this year. The only one I am 100% sold on thus far is Deep Detroit Vol. 3, this year’s edition of Kai Alce’s party that has been one of the highlights of the previous two years. This party has had the best vibe, crowd, and music, and with Omar-S and Brett Dancer holding it down with Kai this year there should be no decline in quality! Sadly it appears there will be no Soul Skate this year, I guess that will have to wait till next time.

I haven’t really done much research into other parties just yet, I’ll see what flyers I find on Friday and talk to my people up there to see what’s really happening before deciding. If you hit me up via email or txt message, I will let you know what I’m getting into on any given night! I’ll try to report back here each day if I can with plenty of pictures of whatever I get into in Detroit during the day as well as the parties at night. Definitely check my Twitter page for the real-time business!

Keep an eye out for the Noleian Reusse record on Love What You Feel in the shops, and we’ll also have copies if you need to pick one up. We may also have some other Pittsburgh Track Authority related goodies, as well as other projects we’ve been working on that will remain on the DL for now, so if you see me, ask!

Wow, the last post I delivered certainly received a lot of feedback. Much appreciated to all those who replied and gave their two-cents worth. If I had the wherewitall and the time, I’d love to promote a Sunday afternoon gig that would be family-friendly – preferably outdoors in good weather, with a BBQ and a killer soundsystem. My kids love to dance – they’ll dance to bloody anything! Such events are commonplace in other cities, why not Dublin?

Having re-read my last post, I realised that there could be a perception that I was unfairly critical of Carl Craig. It was not my intention to have a go at him – just to show how times have changed and how he has changed with them.  The man is a hero and his contribution to electronic music can’t be understated.

Now, the purpose of this post is just to regale an anectdote about a Craig set I had the pleasure of hearing back in the late ’90s. He was djing in U2′s club, The Kitchen (which has just reopened), at a techno night which was bi-weekly.

He was playing loads of amazing music – some of the Common Factor tracks off his Planet E releases, his re-edit of Talking Heads ‘Once In A Lifetime’ – then he dropped ’Phylps Track II’ , a track which I don’t think I’d ever heard out before then. Needless to say, it blew my ‘noggin. Into this he brought in his remix of ‘Good Life’, with its Timbaland-style vocals, which came about before Timbaland. I didn’t think it could get much better – he let the vocals ride over the perfect techno dub of BC. But then he messed up, the vocals going out of time  and getting further and further out of sync.

He tried to correct the situation, and failed, so he started the mix all over again. Deadly. Same thing happened again. Still he persevered, failed to correct matters and began the process all over again. Good thing ‘Phylps Track II’ is so long. The mix went awry yet again, but he got through it this time. Although not executed all that well, it is a mix that has stayed in my brain for the last 12 years or so. Of course, myself and my mates immediately tried to immitate this mix as soon as we got home. I think he was a better dj then, because of the music he played, back when his deck skills weren’t so sharp.

Tying into Kenny’s post about pre-planning, for a bit of ISM continuity, I’d say Carl pre-planned this mix – he just couldn’t execute it as well as he’d hoped for. It still stood out for me, beyond a zillion perfect mixes I’ve heard before.

Carl Craig hit my home town of Dublin recently, the night before Paddy’s Day, as part of the tour celebrating 20 years of Planet E. A pal of mine was considering going – but, he asked, would he look out of place in the crowd at the venue, as he is a man in his mid-thirties? I told him that he would feel like he was from another era if he went (as the picture above shows). Also, the ability to muster up a posse to accompany him on his folly would be impossible – his cronies don’t do techno any more. Plus, I added, it would probably be rubbish (although, if Craig played just the back-catalogue of his label, it would be quite wonderful – but that would only happen in la-la land, wouldn’t it?).

It made me think about the manner in which individuals of my vintage enjoyed this music, and if they still did - people from the same generation as Craig himself (well, nearly). In my part of the world, attending clubs is seen as a young person’s game – people in their thirties (and above) have other priorities in their lives: mortgages, kids, impending doom and debt. No longer care-free and full of boundless energy. Mustering the wherewithall to go to a club until the wee hours seems like a Herculean task.

Thing is, I still love the music. And I still want to enjoy it – now, though, it’s confined to ease the pain of running and to take the mind off the monotony of exercise. The Internet is my only access to this culture now – mixes from RA, this blog and others are my sole means to finding out what trends are taking hold and which artists. Even on the net, things have evolved. I am on a music mailing list which used to clog up my inbox, now traffic is sparse, intermittent at best. The majority of suscribers have fallen away, I suspect, because of lack of interest.

I still can’t help but view house/techno as something vibrant and new, but that idea is skewed. It’s no longer the new kid on the block, the vibrant upstart. It’s part of the corporate establishment. Just look at Craig, it seems his best work may be behind him – now he is living off his name and past achievements while melding into the commercial end of dance music. I don’t blame him, he’s probably thinking of his retirement fund - he is probably so jaded that he has entered another dimension of jadedness.

It must be so hard to maintain your ‘A game’, remaining cutting edge and still retain your love for the music, especially when the gap between you and your audience becomes bigger and bigger in terms of age and outlook.

He had a great innings – as the Planet E compilation clearly shows. He has given us so much, but the run had to end some time. However, the fact that he is gonna play Detroit in his 69 guise shows that there is always hope that he can raise the bar once again and continue to inspire a new generation.

EDIT: As has been mentioned in the comments, I referenced the wrong publication – it was Jockey Slut, not Muzik, which used the blindfold gimmick. It’s all just a haze . . . .

Back in the late 1990s, there existed a British dance music magazine called Muzik, which was supposed to be more ‘high brow’ and aimed at ‘serious’ music lovers. It was a well put together publication, if memory serves me well. One  particular gimmick that they employed that has stuck in my mind was a review system they had.

They used to get in guest reviewers – producers, djs – blindfold them (they would be pictured with the blindfolds on – the review pages were pictorially driven) and then the vinyl would be played to them and they would  give their opinions.

One particualr review pair stick out in my mind – Francois K and Maurice Fulton. And one particular record which they disparaged remains firmly ensconced in my brain. It was Octave One’s Untold 12″, which features Black Water. The reaction of both of them was ‘meh’ – no great shakes at all. 

Amazing. Just shows that even those who are considered to be at the top of their field couldn’t spot a bona fide classic when they heard one. It may not be to everyone’s taste but you think they would recognise that it had a hook that would give it massive cross-over appeal.

I would love to avail of the gimmick that Muzik, though. When it comes to music, I am, unfortunately, predjudiced. I used to a complete music snob (insert ‘twat’) and have relaxed my strict doctrine – but not enough.

However, if I could go to a record shop (if there were any decent ones left in Dublin), have them blindfold me and then play me what gems they had on offer, I might find myself genuinely surprised, with previous inbuilt notions taking a serious battering.

No matter how much I try, preconceived notions play their part.

OK, this one is gonna be a lil bit long, but instead of making a bunch of separate posts I’m just gonna throw a load of different stuff in together. January isn’t generally seen as that busy a month in music so apologies for the lack of posts. Looking at a bunch of my recent purchases it seems I’ve spent the last few weeks picking up on a few end of 2010 releases more so than 100% hot off the presses 12″s but December ain’t really a time of year that I get to buy records so one tends to miss a few things around then. Before I get to them I’m gonna give a quick heads up on some gig action going on over the next few weeks, throw a couple of links to some top class mixes doing the rounds along with a few other bits n’ bobs.

First up is this Friday (4th of February) here in Dublin with the launch party of Lunar Disko’s latest release, a compilation I reviewed in this post a while back. The party is taking place in new-ish venue The Sweeney Mongrel on Dame St which is a nice lil intimate venue and the party is free, so no excuses! I’ll be opening the night followed by Automatic Tasty, who’s live sets are properly amazing and the man like Lerosa will be closing the night off with a Dj Set. Leo has also supplied a rather brilliant new mix for our boys in Cork, Sunday Times! which is on an italo/new wave tip. Also, over at the Mntothat site, the boys behind Lunar give some insight into their label along with a few words from the night’s 2 guests.

The week after I’m heading back out west to Bap To The Future at the Beirhaus in Galway on Saturday the 12th, where I played along side LA’s GB last year. This time around myself and Noid the Droid will be manning the decks for the night for, well, god knows what sort of mash up of tunes. Between us there aren’t many genres that won’t be touched on. Again, this is free in. For any Dublin based folk, ISM’s Gmos will be in the Twisted Pepper at Discotekken alongside Choice Cut’s Handsome Paddy on the same night. Along with Lerosa, Paddy has delivered one of the best mixes in recent months with his Kick Out The Jams selection which you can find here. He touches on Hip Hop, Electro, modern Bass bizness and all sorts on this highly energetic mix. I challenge thee not to enjoy it!

Back in the Twisted Pepper on Saturday the 19th, Barry Redsetta, one of Dublin’s finest house and techno djs is kick starting a new night, Jam The Box with Donnacha Costello performing a special Color Series live set. This series of 12″s from the middle of the last decade is my favourite work of Donnacha’s and arguably his best, so this should be pretty awesome. Myself and Barry will be on warm up duties for the night. Moving swiftly on…

I was out a few weeks ago when a chap I know came up to me talking about my latest mix and he made a jokey comment about me putting a bootleg on it (regular readers will know that we lot here aren’t huge fans of the bootleg, even though I ain’t gonna deny owning some). I was a little bit perplexed, especially when he said it was this release from Rush Hour’s House Of Trax series. It turns out that on Facebook somebody from Trax Records had made a statement saying that neither Rush Hour or Dj History had consulted or cleared anything with Trax in Chicago over the material they were using.

We know-and we recognize- that this year there are several projects coming out with the TRAX name but we want to let you know that a majority of these projects have not even contacted us-the original Chicago label-or anything. A majority of things such as the Rush Hour re-issues and the upcoming TRAX Re-edits are projects which we had no say in — we were not even contacted for music, let alone any say towards the releases.

I found this quite strange as a) Rush Hour didn’t seem like the sort to go bootlegging b) how could they think they’d get away with such high profile boots, with little else said in the press and c) the sound quality on these releases were generally so good that I couldn’t imagine they were bootlegged…

So has the most revered label of the last 12 months been a naughty boy?? The simple answer is, no. I decided to contact Christiaan from Rush Hour and ask him about these claims and he then passed me on to Demon Music, the company who Rush Hour worked along side on the project. Many of you may be aware that quite some time ago the ownership of much of Trax’s output was transferred over to Casablanca Music, and since then Demon have taken control of the licensing of the music. Now, Discogs does state that there are some current legal wranglings going on between Trax and Casablanca, but rest assured, the Rush Hour re-issues ARE above board..and there will be more old gems to come! And so on to some new musaks…

Phochos – Glaciers/Interface Phrase 1 / House of Jezebel – Love and Happiness Danny Wolfers, aka Legowelt, has been on somewhat of a roll the last 6 months or so. Always prolific under his various different guises, these two latest 12″s include some wonderful input from him. He’s on a tranced-out techno tip on his remix on the Phochos 12″ which sits very nicely along side the aptly titled opener Glaciers. Chances are you are gonna go straight for the dancefloor cut but Glaciers cosmic, cinematic bliss is its equal.

The House of Jezebel 12″ is basically a fairly straight up cover of Ron Hardy’s old unreleased track. Hardy can be a bit of a sacred cow to some but I don’t care, this version is better. He’s not really done anything but add some more drums over the top, but he ramps up the drama something else on it. It went unreleased for quite some time, instead just sitting on his website which neatly brings me on to this unreleased remix, which I hope appears on wax soon. Outstanding acid spiced electro from the mysterious Haddawolf…

Various – Long Slow Heat Death Ep On my yearly round up I gave a quick mention to Slabs of The Tabernacle crew in Scotland. Following on from their night and website, they started a label, Tabernacle Records, the 2nd of which is this first class split ep of darker edged electro featuring Ditone and Fancy & Spook, 2 acts who previously released on Heatray Records (which I’m now going to check out thanks to this 12″) I don’t hear enough of this kind of electro these days, of such high quality.

Cottam – Cottam EP 4 There’s been quite a bit of furore over the Cottam 12″s over the last year or two but up until now I’ve never quite had the urge to pick up any of them. I was sold on this one purely for the A1 cut, which works for me as a sort of guilty pleasure big room disco/acid house growler, coming on like a slightly tamer version of this cracking 12″ that Rush Hour dropped in ’09. Sure there’s nothing wrong with throwin’ yer arms in the air every so often, eh?

Kassem Mosse – 2D – Gunnar Wendal has become a bit of a poster boy in the last year for, well, any genre he cares to touch. Here he’s on a rugged, lo-fi house and electro tip and he once again delivers in spades.

Gatekeeper – Giza The Chicago duo continue on their quest to make the most bombastic EBM/Electro music going with their follow up to 2009′s monstrous Optimus Maximus. This is even better and, unsurprisingly, disappeared off the shelves in what seemed like a matter of hours. It’s about as subtle as an over-sized battering ram, and all the better for it

E.R.P. – Evoked Potentials (Part 3) The enigmatic Gerard Hanson returns for another round of these highly sought after releases on the Spanish label, Semantica, this time a whole 400 getting pressed up, which means it should last in the shops maybe more than 10 minutes. Any new material from Mr Hanson tends to get a fevered reception from his fans due to the scarcity of his output, but they may still be slightly let down by the original composition delivered for this 10″. A “standard” E.R.P. track is still enjoyable fare, and Repose has a solid low slung groove with the usual atmospheric, melancholic ambience we’ve come to expect, but it still feels a little less vital than some of what he’s done. The flipside, on the other hand, places this right back in the essential pile, an invigorating remix of Sensory Process (Off Part 1 of the series) by London’s Plant43. He tones down the drama of the original slightly, and tightens up the bass and percussion and while it still occupies that brooding, dark territory of the original, his own personality is firmly stamped on it.

Semantica have also decided to do a repress of sorts of the first in their ERP series, with a 200 pressing 10″ which contains the original of Sensory Process but not the flipside, Lodestone. Slightly annoying, but better than nothing after the ludicrously small pressing (100) they did for the Ep in the first place. Amusingly enough though, 114 claim to have it on Discogs. Do the bullshitters actually think they are impressing us??

Sfera Celeste Project feat. Fred Ventura – Celestial Stars/Walk With Me This grabbed my attention initially because of Ventura’s name but I’m not really gone on Celestial Stars, the vocal track he contributes to on here. It’s the flip that wins out here, a fine electro number that takes it’s cues from John Carpenter’s trademark spine-tingling keys. It doesn’t do much bar shuffle along in a moody fashion (not in a bad way, mind) and there is a pretty lush pay off near the end with some 80′s style pads.

Some time ago Tom made a post about the decline in quality in a lot of Planet E’s output in the last few years. Well 2011 sees it celebrate it’s 20th Anniversary, and as is the way these things go, there’ll be compilations/remixes etc coming out over the next while. Excited? Not really. He’s picked a number of artists to remix various tracks from over the years and bar maybe Kirk Degiorgio (who’s remixing that woeful Martin Buttrich “Stoned Autopilot” shite) and Mad Mike he’s opted to select some fairly uninspiring names such as Loco Dice, Luciano, Francois K, Ricardo Villalobos, Seth Troxler..ugh I couldn’t be arsed listing off the rest. Whatever about choosing to get big names in on it, the likes of Villalobos, Hawtin, Francois K and, as much I revere the guy, Mad Mike, are generally past their best (irregardless of what you feel about their high points, creatively). ZZZzzzzzz.

Out with the old and in with the new I say! Fellow blogger Kuri of Energy Flash has just announced that he is kick starting a new label this year. The release date isn’t 100% but you can check out some info and samples of the first release here, and I must say I’m really impressed by how the A1 and B1 cuts are sounding. It’s always good to see peeps getting out there past the internet scribing and dipping their toes in the big bad world of releasing music so all the best with things, Kuri.

Aaaand finally, this post is nearly over. We may not cover much in the world of Hip Hop on ISM but that don’t mean we aren’t fans. As a reward for trawling through this fucking long post, here’s a cool interview with Pete Rock and Dj Premier. The info say’s it is just an out-take from some Japanese DVD but this 1hr long chat is pretty impressive on it’s own. The 2 guys just sit there and talk shit on their history and a bunch of the music they worked on. Pretty entertaining stuff.

While we may not be the most regular posters in the realm of dance blogging, a bunch of us are now on Twitter talking shit on each other and everyone/everything else 24/7. It really is a pretty entertaining thing to do on your phone when stuck in traffic, waiting on the bus, etc. Anyway, if you’re trying to get down with us on there, you can find us here:

Pipecock

Kenny

Count Zer0

and of course you can get an update every time a post is made here from the ISM account:

ISM

There are also plenty of ISM extended family, cohorts, friends, and related artists on there so just look through the people we follow!

Apparently, Theo Parrish is pissing people off by charging more than the “standard” amount of money for some of his new “limited” records. This is something Moodymann has been criticized for in the past as well. In fact, I criticized DeepChord for similar practices in a post 3 years ago. I have to say that in the years that have gone by, my opinion has changed. I originally thought that resale prices would get crazier than their original prices. Long term, most of those DeepChord double packs resell for approximately what they sold for new in the first place. One of my least favorite aspects of the record business is the resale market where dealers mark up records to astronomical prices, and the original artist sees NO MONEY from this. For small pressing records that have been out of print for decades, there isn’t much you can do about that. With brand new records though, there are more options.

What has been going on recently with Moodymann and Theo Parrish records has been particularly heinous. Records that are just out brand new have been bought up by speculators who then turn around and sell on Discogs or Ebay for crazy prices because they are no longer available elsewhere. You have no choice if you want the record and you didn’t happen to do an order the hour it was available in the shops. Malik Pittman’s Unirhythm Green record suffered a similar fate. This is NOT good for the actual fans and people who want to support the artists because they are paying some joker inflated prices to basically be ticket scalpers. By charging more than the standard amount of money, the number of speculators is going to be severely limited, especially if there is no guarantee that the price will go up from its already high going rate. It also means that records will be available longer in the stores at their retail price. Best of all, it means that the extra money paid actually goes to the artist, label, and record store as opposed to the speculating reseller.

Perhaps it is my own ventures in the record slanging business that has made me rethink the economics of selling new records, but I have to say that the artist and label getting paid and fans getting the records they want are the most important aspects of the hustle. Cutting out the middle man (except for those who really sleep) and being more fair albeit at a higher price is definitely one solution for limited press records that are in high demand that so far seems to work a little bit better than the old way. Is this going to be a viable solution for every artist (or even every release by Theo and Kenny)? I seriously doubt it. Their positions are quite distinct as I can’t think of any current artists whose new music changes hands at such consistently high prices. These guys are not morons, they know what is going on with this shit. Other artists/labels are welcome to try similar methods, but the results are probably not going to be the same.

That said, I always prefer good music to be more widely available. Of course, that isn’t how some people want to do things. I would like to see more sanity in how in demand limited pressings end up being sold, and this is definitely one step in a different direction. Only a fool would pay the crazy prices for the Sketches LP on Discogs. How long will these be for sale at those prices with no buyers before the price comes down closer to what it originally sold for? I didn’t follow the secondhand DeepChord prices this whole time, but looking back with three years hindsight it seems that the original asking price was relatively fair for the demand. Everybody wins.

What it all boils down to for me in the end is that I know what I like, and I have no problem paying money for things that I like. I generally don’t spend crazy dough on second hand records because that money is going to people who did nothing aside from finding a copy of a record for less than they’re selling it to you for. So I keep digging for deals. With new records, I decide if something is too much money by comparing how much I like it to how much money I have and am willing to spend. If it doesn’t add up, I don’t buy it. If it does, I do. Theo’s recent remix on a Japanese import label was selling for close to $30 new, and I didn’t think it was worth that so I passed on it. I don’t really harbor any anger about it. The Amerie/Lil Louis mashup was worth the money, so I paid it. End of story.

Despite widespread complaints from last year regarding the sound and set-up at the “Underground” stage at DEMF (including some scathing comments from yours truly), Paxahau has gone ahead and stuck the “Made in Detroit” lineup (which includes most of the Detroit based artists performing at the festival, of course many of those being the black local artists) back in the hell-hole again this year.

This is absolutely unacceptable, and we cannot stand for it any longer!

This goal of this post is to put pressure on Paxahau to change this. I don’t want to hear, “Well, we’ve worked out a new stage design and have taken steps to fix the acoustics of the Underground.” or anything like that. This is not just a problem isolated to last year. The underground is CONSISTENTLY bad sounding. This is what happens when you put a huge soundsystem into a concrete bunker. The horrible sound is only part of it, though. The underground stage also features the worst general setup with few nice places to sit and chill out, or to stand and observe what is going on. Completely aside from that, this is an outdoor festival. Why would I want to spend so much of my time inside?

Those are just the logistical problems, of course. The fact that so many great black Detroit artists are being hidden away is possibly even MORE disturbing. This is the second year in a row where this has occurred. Why can’t Beatport get that stage this year? Since there were a few years (under Paxahau’s guidance, no less) where the underground was NOT used, I can’t believe that they MUST use it. But if they MUST, why does it have to be the black Detroit artists down there every time?!?!?! Sorry, but there is absolutely no good reason for this to be the case. If they have to get a tent and set it up like they did in ’07, that’s fine. They have almost a month to get it together!

Here’s what I want people to do: comment here voicing your support for getting rid of the “Underground” area starting RIGHT NOW, as in this year. The more comments here, the better! Then, after commenting here, spread the word to every message board, blog, social networking site (that means post it on Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, etc.) so that more people can see it. And most importantly, go to Paxahau’s website, their Myspace, their Facebook, their Youtube, whatever. You can find links to all their spots at the bottom of their web page. Go there, and either write you own message to them, or copy and paste the one below. And of course leave a link to this post. Let’s see if we can get them to fix this absolutely horrible decision before it ruins yet another festival!

Dear Paxahau,

We sincerely appreciate the work you are doing and have done to keep DEMF/Movement happening every year. However, it is unacceptable to put the Detroit stage in the Underground where there are so many problems. Especially considering how many black Detroit artists are playing there, this seems like an odd way to throw a “Detroit” festival. We implore you to move that stage out of the concrete bunker permanently, beginning this year.

http://infinitestatemachine.com/2010/04/30/dear-paxahau-this-is-not-okay-no-more-underground-stage/

Thank you,

It has been brought to my attention many times over the past year or so that people have had problems leaving comments on ISM posts. Generally, it seemed to be some kind of irritating nonsense with Firefox’s Javascript implementation screwing with the spam-blocking plug-in we had installed. This resulted in the inability for people to post comments at times, including ISM writers even when we were logged in to the site!

A few weeks ago, I changed the spam-blocking plug-in over to another one that seems to be far more effective in allowing everyone to comment, though at the expense of it flagging a few REAL comments for me to review every week or so. I’m now getting into the habit of checking the flagged comments once a day, so even if that happens (and it rarely does, I think there have been two instances in about three weeks), it won’t take long for the comment to show up on the site.

We greatly appreciate our comments section, from the regulars to one-time posters, so please feel free to dialogue with us! We have some DEMF pre-coverage coming up in the next few weeks, and of course more fantastic mixes from our own writers as well as our awesome guests.