This was a really interesting documentary I found on The Prodigy through Synthtopia. It centers on their subliminal messages, marketing, and influences. Its a 50 minute 4 part youtube. Well worth the watch.

So like i mentioned a few weeks ago, I sold my old 15 inch MacBook Pro on eBay. eBay, which essentially requires you to use its wholly owned subsidiary paypal, got 7.14% from the transaction. Now I’m not against eBay trying to make money, and the do provide a valuable service and should be compensated for it, but WTF. 7 percent! That’s loan shark prices.  eBay will claim they only take 3 to 3.5 percent, but then they get the rest by making you use paypal. How about giving users a free paypal pass when selling on eBay? Maybe then I won’t have to start looking for alternatives…

Meet Walter, the newest addition to the Charles clan. I adopted Walter from the local SPCA in Monroe, CT. He is approximately 2 years, but we don’t know for sure. He’s a Sato, which is apparently a Puerto Rican term, meaning “street dog”. I’m not sure what exactly he is, but he appears to be a good ‘ol fashioned mutt. He is 42 pounds, and all brown except for a white chest and paws that are spotted. He’s also a big softie with a great heart. He’s much more well behaved then I was expecting, but we got a few thing to work on. He’s super cool, and everybody loves him.

There are lots of dogs out there in need of good homes. All the animals I’ve ever had were adopted. If you are thinking about getting a pet, adopt. Give a poor animal a good home. It’ll boost your karma a few points. More picture after the jump.

On Saturday, April 25th, 2009 Room 960 in Hartford, CT played host to the annual club event known as the White Party. For one night, club-goers get dressed in white from head to toe and gather to dance to the music of Randy Boyer, Kristina Sky, and Mike Charles. Mike kicked off the night with a 2 1/2 hour set that slowly rose to a boil, before cooling to a simmer and handing the decks off to Mr. Boyer. It was during the boiling point of his set that madman Mike Charles chose to further instigate the already anxious dancefloor by biting his headphones in half [pictured above] right at the peak of one of his signature house tracks. The crowd responded with frenzied excitement after witnessing the sacrifice to the dance gods and the tone was set for evening. Mike had to finish his set using Randy’s headphones which met a much more humane end. After the night had ended Randy headphones were released back into the wild.

I’m not even going to attempt to describe this one. Just check out the video above, think about the amount of effort this must have took, then imagine Daddy Charles making an endless slew of sheep f*cker jokes.

So right now I’m in the middle of the what will eventually be know as “The Great MySpace Purge of 2009″. After joining Facebook, where I actually know the people on my friends list, I realized exactly how useless my MySpace page had become. Last month I started out with 2000+ friends, but now I’m down to 900 and I’m not finished. It was necessary, it had to be done. 

I started to notice patterns as I have mercilessly deleted page after page of what I think may have been people at one time, and outlined the patterns in the chart above. Please note that I’ve shown very little discretion [get it] during this process, so if you were deleted by accident, I’m sorry, please send me a friend request with a message letting me know you are human.

and one more after the jump…

Going back 6 months or more, I was in the market for a Mac Pro. My MacBook Pro is a great computer, but when it came to music production, I felt that I needed something with more horsepower to really get into it. Mac Pros are some of the most powerful machines available, and command hefty price tags. I decided a used one would work just fine for me and set out to eBay. I tried and tried but no dice and I decided to check out CraigsList to see what they had to offer. I found an ad for a man not to far away selling off some old gear from his studio. I called him and set up a meeting at his studio that weekend.

It turns out the studio belonged to Mark Kaplowe, a the golden voice of many TV and Radio ads, and a marketing specialist. We met and I checked out the gear he had available, but unfortunately he wasn’t ready to part with the Mac Pro that day. We got to talking and he said “You really know a lot about Macs, huh?” and I admitted my professed love for all things Mac. He explained his IT guy had just quit and wondered if I was interested in being available to help if a problem arose. I told him to call me when something goes wrong and I’ll see what I can do, since I’ve been known to moonlight from time to time.

A week later, sure enough, something went wrong and he called. It took me 2 visits to his studio and a lot longer than I would have liked, but I fixed everything, while we talked. He started grilling me about my interest and passions. I was a little caught off guard at first, but finally revealed my true passion electronic music. I talked about how long I’ve ben doing this, the trials and tribulations of the business, and where I ideally wanted to be. That when he pulls a piece of paper and write at the top “The launch of Mike Charles” on it. 

Marketing is a big part of music, [how else are people going to find out about me?], but its something I never really cared for. I was never good at portraying myself as the super awesome best DJ around that you need to hear, but Mark breaks it down and literally lays out a road map of how we can do this, be honest about, and get my goals accomplished. 

I won’t bore you with all the details, [nor am I ready to reveal my super-secret plan for world domination!], but since then we’ve had tons of conversations that have really helped me market myself. I’ve also fixed several other tech problems, and after hearing him say “Massapequa” I was able to get the DanceCast a golden, professional voice.

All this has been great, but the best part is not the help I’ve received in my endeavors, but the fact that I [who is closely guarded] was able to add new friend to the arsenal of the eclectic Charles Clan. 

“If you could pick one of your mixes that you feel portrays your music the best, which would it be?”

So this was actually a pretty difficult question to answer and my initial reaction was that they all portray me in one respect or another. I didn’t think I could get off the hook that easy, so I gave my best, honest answer. Click through to read more on this.

In a nutshell I told her I love all my mixes, and that Episode 22 currently gets heavy rotation on my iPod, but despite that, if force to pick only one mix, that I would choose The Velvet Turtle.

But here is the funny part, exactly 11 minutes after the email, another popped into my mail box. It was a new comment on an old post from rallevondalle who said he was really enjoying The Velvet Turtle and wanted a tracklisting. I just thought the coincidence was perfectly time, almost validating my personal opinion.

So for our new DanceCast friend rallevondalle here is The Velvet Turtle’s tracklisting:

1. Massive Attack – Dissolved Girl (2006 Breaks Mix)
2. Underworld – Two Months Off (Breaks Mix)
3. Stanton Warriors – Still Here feat. Eska
4. Chicken Lips – She Not In (Stanton Warriors Remix)
5. The Egg – Walking Away (Breaks Mix)
6. Alter Ego – Rocker (Stanton Warriors Unreleased Mix)
7. Moguai – Get On
8. Pierre Hiver – Da Funk 2k4
9. Deep Dish – Say Hello (Dylan Rhymes Acid Thunder Remix)
10. The Hives – Because I Wanna (2005 Remix)
11. Oasis – Wonderwall (Breaks Mix)
12. DJ Icey – ???
13. Punk vs. I Believe (Breaks Mix)
14. Way Out West feat. Kristy Hawkshaw – Stealth (Rennie Pilgrem & Commie Remix)

FYI: Check the comments section on your iPod for tracklisting or go here to find them all online: The DanceCast.

Man that guy was awesome.