Mike’s Gig in Phoenix
Phoenix, AZ is spectacular place to play. I’ve played there 3 times now, and each time its been awesome. This was without a doubt one of the best gigs I’ve had in years, and is certainly top 5 all time. Here is the story of what went down in the desert.
I spend Saturday morning practicing and reviewing my controller set up, followed by some packing and then it’s off to Palm Beach Int’l Airport. I get there a little early because trying to get through security with a DJ setup it typically not easy. I find a cool looking TSA guys and when he looks at the bag, I tell him he might as well just take it off the conveyer belt now. He looks in and instantly says “are you a DJ”? He then asks me if I like David Guetta [which I don’t] so I just mention he’s been very successful, collect my bag and go. Easiest security screening ever. With time to kill I grab a beer and jot some notes in my DJ diary.
After a layover in Austin, TX, I make it to PHX. This airport is basically 4 airports in 1 and finding someone is always a challenge. One of the local DJs, a cool dude named Nick who goes by Skeltaboy, picks me up and we head to the venue. Unlike previous trips, in which we drove up into mountains then out into the desert, this time the party is in a warehouse district fairly close to the airport. As we pull up, I notice some seriously long lines. I ask Nick how many people they are expecting and he replies “about 2000 to 2500”. I knew right then and there I was in for one serious evening.
I find the VIP area, change, stash my equipment, and head out. The sound is quality, lighting is very good, and the stage is real nice. I wander and check out some local DJ sets. It’s early, but already the party is in full swing. Out front, the lines have grown quite large. At some point the main room gets so crowded and you can move, at all. Pushing doesn’t even help. I have to sneak out a back exit, walk around the block and re-enter through the main gate to get back to the VIP area. Meanwhile the line out front… still huge. I decide its best to stay in the VIP room for a while. I hang out with the ArcAttack boys, and then have a beer with Showtek [the popular dutch hard dance act]. We all b/s and talk shop. The venue owner was in and out as well, and let me say this: he’s the coolest venue owner I’ve ever met.
As the evening progresses, it’s getting to be time for the Charles to take the stage. The place is now so packed and wild that 2 security staff have to be called to escort me to the stage. DJ D-Lyte it banging some serious NRG style 150 bpm stuff, and I’m not sure how I’m gonna get down to 130 BPM electro. Mike Saga has the mic so I tell he, let the track play out and ask the crowd if they like electro. They bite. They are so amped up I think they might have cheered for an Irish Polka. Either way I have my in and we go straight into some heavy electro.
Several times early I come out from behind the decks and amp these people up. I’m slapping hand with everyone behind the barricade like some sort of rock star, and we really start to connect. I feed off the energy and we have some serious fun, with some great tunes that are not at all what they expect. I’m happy I was able to win over a hard dance crowd early, or it could have been a long night. On a couple occasions I try to hand out stickers but there are so many people, I end up just chucking them out into the crowd. After the night was over, none were on the floor.
At some point, my beats attract the full compliment of go –go dancers to the stage. They are great eye candy, and the crowd is rockin’. A staff member ask me if I want to clear a few of the girls off b/c the crowd can barely see me and I reply “No way, they’re a lot better looking than I am” and besides the current arrangement appears to working out just fine.
Now I was supposed to play Dubstep as well, but I really wasn’t focused on that at the time. A cute little dance come up to me and says “don’t you have some Dubstep?” and I say of course I do. I set up a mix, loop it, and lower the volume. I grab the mic and as the crowd about a rumor I head that they like Dubstep. The deafening roar of a response tells me they like it. I un-loop and drop into dub. It goes over very well and not a single person has left, despite this being the final set of the evening. When we do finally finish, I get a huge applause and I have that indescribable feeling that I’ve been chasing for years, and only experience very rarely. It’s the best feeling I’ve ever felt, the audience’s satisfaction with my performance is overwhelming.
I barely sleep because my body does know the time zone difference, but the next day I hang with the promoters and other headliners. It was a great way to chill and decompress, and crack jokes about the English, Welsh, and Americans. I have to give props to TMC for putting together a spectacular show. Special thanks goes out to GREM and Faye for bring me out, turning me lose on their crowd, and taking good care of their DJs. I hope to be back out west soon.
DanceCast Episode 42
Today’s mix is a quick one I did full of Progressive Tech House track I’ve recently come across.
I’m blogging on a regular basis again fo head over to mikecharles.net and don’t forget to leave us a review in iTunes.
Duration: 34:49
1. Cala A Boca (Meat Katie Remix) / D-Nox And Beckers
2. Slap / Umek
3. Lambda Driver / Mak N Tek
4. Life Of Nite /Mak N Tek
5. Death By House [A. Mochi Remix] / Len Faki
6. Drop / Ascion & D Carbone
A&H Xone 2D Drivers Updated!
This one may save you a headache if you use any of Allen & Heath’s Xone Midi Controllers.
Any of you who care know that I use an A&H Xone 2D as my primary Traktor Pro controller with great effect. In preparing for my AZ gig next week, I’ve been refining the midi map in Traktor. In long practice sessions, TP would stop recognizing the midi controller and quitting TP would cause a kernel panic in OS X. As I’m sure you can imagine, this concerned me greatly with a big gig coming up next week. I first updated TP to the latest 1.2.4 version, which did not help. I realized that 3 weeks ago I upgraded to 10.6 Snow Leopard so I decided to check out the Xone website and sure enough, there are new drivers for 10.6.
Removing the old drivers and replacing with the new ones appears to have rectified the situation. Also FYI for those of you still using the borg OS, there appear to be new Windows 7 drivers as well.
Getting Back to Work
I’m going to make an effort to start blogging and podcasting with more regularity again. I know for the last 6 months things have been spotty at best, but the truth is “real world” pressures have just caught up with me. Moving from Connecticut to Florida was more difficult that I expected, and once I got down here I didn’t exactly take to my new surrounding like a duck in water. Adapting to a new area after living my entire life within a 15 mile radius of Bridgeport, CT was more difficult that I thought it would be. Compounding the situation were the holidays which were right around the corner. Christmas made me miss my family very much, more than had anticipated. It hurt. I figure I’ve always been adaptable and resilient and this wouldn’t be a big deal. Turns out, I’m human after all.
In addition to being mentally drained, my new job is demanding more of my time than ever before. The end result has left me worn out, in a creative rut, and without as much desire to plow forward as usual. I would like to publically thank Mike Hindle and DJ Airty for continuing to contribute great mixes to the DanceCast while I regroup and try to regain my old form. Both are spectacular DJs with extremely different styles, but most importantly they are good at what they do.
This whole ordeal has been a tough pill to swallow for someone who is very demanding and constantly putting pressure on himself, but I taking a step back and accepting things for what they are. I think I’m starting to work my way out of this funk, and hopefully I’ll be back in full swing soon. Maybe this gig out in AZ will jump start the process.
A big thank you goes out to those of you who have stuck around, and continued to be a great inspiration to me.
Mike in Phoenix January 30th
So I’ve talked about Phoenix, AZ in the past. Typically it’s because of a gig, or the live podcasts came from that gig. I’ve got some promoter friends out that on occasion, fly me out there and give me the pleasure of playing for there totally awesome crowd. So on January 30th I am headed out there once again. It’s going to be cool. They’ve got a healthy and lively rave scene out there and the last time I was out there it was spectacular. While this may seem like a late announcement, it’s actually been up on the events page for some time now, but I know that many of you don’t check it. If you are going to be in the Phoenix area, drop me a line and I’ll get you to the show.
DanceCast Episode 41
DJ Airty, our Long Island, NY resident is back with yet another mix full of the best of what is going down in NYC’s Clubland. Merry Christmas!
Duration: 51:41
01. Breana Skiles Dustin Skiles – A Little Love (Seth Vogt Remix)
02. The Face Vs. Mark Brown n Adam Shaw – Needin U (Norman Doray Eivissa Rmx)
03. HMSP All Stars – Rock It (Trompis Cast Mix)
04. Dim Chris – Love Can’t Get U Wrong (Afrojack Remix)
05. Anthony Louis and Paolo Pellegrino feat Sara Luh – Rocking (Radio Mix)
06. Capretta – Candy Medicine (Sted E n Hybrid Heights Mix)
07. David Guetta feat Estelle – One Love (Chuckie n Fatman Scoop Remix)
08. Leventina Nightshift (Prok n Fitch Endless Summer Remix)
09. The Crystal Method – Come Back Clean (Kaskade Extended
10. Matt Darey Pres. Urban Astronauts Feat. Kate Louise Smith – See The Sun (Aurosonic Remix)
11. byron stingily – real_man (jinkzilla remix)
12. Dimitri Vegas n Like Mike – Salinas (White Island Original Mix)
13. x-press 2 – Muzikizum/Lazy
Mike’s DJ Headphone Review
Over at DJ Tech Tools I’ve completed my latest article, a review of four major players in the DJ headphone market. Now my challenges in finding a decent pair of headphones are pretty well documented at this point, so its nice that something good finally came out of it. Head over to DJTT and read it, maybe it will prevent you from having to bite your headphones in half.
P.S. The Sennheiser HD-25s were not reviewed so if you plan on leaving a comment about that, don’t bother.
Synthtopia
Lately I’ve been surfing a blog called Synthtopia a lot. I actually came across it when they re-posted the optimizing your mac article/video I did for DJTT a while back and it is pretty cool. Its basically a daily round up of anything news worthy in the realm of electronic music, controllers, synths, and daw software. I’ve also discovered a crap load of free samples thru Synthtopia, and I’m hooking them up with a link in my blogroll.
So I haven’t been blogging much lately. I’m sure you’ve noticed. I have however been doing a lot of things that are all positive.
First and foremost, the move to FL is complete. What a relief that is. For months now I had been flying back and forth for weeks at a time, while trying to juggle the buying and selling of homes. The dude who bought my house in CT was… less than accommodating. Lets just leave it at that. I do however now have a nice house at the top of South Florida. I also now have a decent room dedicated to music, which is hugh. I can wait to work my way out from under all the boxes, paint it, and set up my studio. I’ve got a lot of ideas in my head and I would really like to get back to making music.
I have also been making a few moves behind the scenes lately and will have a few announcements in the near future, here are a few hints:
- A big new gig at the end of January [You may want to book a plane ticket]
- An upgraded alliance to add to my portfolio
DanceCast Episode 40
DanceCast UK resident Mike Hindle brings us his new mix “Up out ya seats!” … trust me it sounds really good with a british accent.
Duration: 79:23
1. Costello – Bitchy Skills (Udachi Remix)
2. Emailkay – When I look At You (Sduk Remix)
3. Dre Skull – I Want You (AC Slater Remix)
4. Blatta & Inesha – Raw Power (Sawgood Remix)
5. Act Yo Age Feat Drop The Lime – Night Of The Hornheadz (Bird Peterson Remix)
6. Ajapai – Incoming
7. Tim Healey & Tai – Pocket Rocket (Tes La Rok Remix)
8. Doogie Houser – Raisen Brand (Aniki Remix)
9. Udachi & Jubilee – Smoke Rings
10. Boltan – Nine To Five (DZ Remix)
11. Trevor Loveys – Organ Grinder (Dub Frequency Remix)
12. The Count & Sinden – Elephant
13. Crystal Fighters – I Love London (Paparazzi Remix)
14. Round Table Knights – Belly Dance (Mowgli Remix)
15. Sub Focus Feat Culture Shock – Move Higher
16. Nadastom – Save Us
17. The Toxic Avenger – Toxic Is Dead (Drop The Lime Remix)
18. Lea Luna – Leaving For Mars (B.Rich Remix)
19. JFB – Duck Jam / Dj Blaqstarr – Shake It To The Ground (Hindle’s Shake a leg edit)
20. Will Bailey – Hit The Club (Mighty Fools Remix)
21. Sawgood – Pompin!
22. Twisted Bitz Feat MC Freeflow – Can’t Shake This (The Funk Outs Crunk Remix)
23. Butterflake & Garry Caos feat Renee – Immature (Calvatron Remix)
24. Twisted Groove – Accelerator (The Funk Outs Hit The Gas Remix)
25. Ninfa – My Baby Left Me (Gigi Barocco Remix)
26. Street Lord – It’s What You Do To Me (Jack Beats Remix)
27. DJ Fresh Feat Stamina MC & Koko – Hypercaine (Nero Dubstep Remix)
28. Dekline & Wizard – Blow (The Bomb) (Future Prophecies, Erb & Dub, & Ed Solo Remix)
We want to hear your comments. Drop us a line at: mikecharles@gmail.com and tell us what you like to hear or leave us a review in iTunes.