Guest Mix Vol. 5 - DJ The Tornado

So stoked on this guest mix, as my knowledge of electronic music doesn't extend much past Detroit techno & Chicago acid house. Steve Adler aka DJ The Tornado is much much smarter than me at knowing about electronic music, so the fact that this guest post even exists is a wonderful learning experience for me. Also, I have been at many ragers that Tornado absolutely devastated, so this helps to fill in my mental picture of belt-slapping and Jordan jerseys. So if you have a party, what you need to do is hire the man DJ The Tornado in order to make sure that your party is a cool place to be. Links:
http://soundcloud.com/djthetornado
http://www.facebook.com/pages/DJ-The-Tornado/21263807805
myspace.com/djthetornado

I've been DJing for about nine years. Since then my tastes have evolved from spinning mostly hip-hop, funk, and house into buying primarily drum & bass and dubstep. Whenever I play out, I usually play for a long period of time and thus incorporate an amalgamation of sounds into each set. I might start out with a top 40 hip-hop banger and later go into some electro-house before finishing with dubstep, other times I blend a Young Gunz instrumental with Simon & Garfunkel's "Cecilia" - it all depends on what you like and, more importantly, what your audience is feeling. When I was commissioned to make this mix for Primitive Future, I wanted to do two things - first, show off my skills and hopefully get booked and raise my profile. Second, I wanted to introduce the readers of Todd's blog to something new. I feel it's important to note that so many times people think that just because I play a certain kind of music out that that is all I listen to at home. As a matter of fact, I listen to music that is all across the board and love being introduced to new things. I could have easily made an ambient mix, a shoegaze mix, or something like the mixes already posted. The fear I have in posting this is that it won't be taken as seriously as traditional, band-based music because so often people think that any music with a rude bass line is meant for the clubs, or maybe the gym, but not for home listening. This is what makes putting together a studio mix extremely hard. When making a mix of any sort of "dance" music, it has to be just that - danceable. I have to contrast that with knowing that most readers of this blog will be listening to this on their MP3 players on the bus ride to and from work, not before they go out to the club (although you can do that, too).

Another layer to this is being able to put together a mix of music that is not listened to by most people. How do I introduce a genre (drum & bass) to people when it is seen as too fast, too loud, or too heavy to the general public? How do I represent a very diverse scene in a short time and leave people with the impression that this music is worth listening to and worth promoting? At the same time, how do I stay true to the genre's roots and "keep it real"? I want to play quality music that has crossover appeal. A daunting task, indeed.

For the second half of the mix, I decided to slow it down a bit and focus on the dubstep sound which has slowly been gathering steam in the underground for years. It has achieved critical acclaim due to albums from producers like Burial and Benga, but has also destroyed dancefloors thanks to heavy hitters like Skream, Plastician, Caspa and Rusko. A genre which grew out of the grime, garage, and drum & bass scenes in the UK, dubstep has become more and more popular stateside in recent months, thanks to DJs like Diplo and Craze incorporating the sound in their sets. I tried to show off what I think are the best representations of dubstep - there are the deeper bits, the wicked impact tunes, more commercial tracks, and a cheeky bootleg remix - with a classic hardcore tune thrown in, strictly for the heads that know.

Some might say I take DJing too seriously, but I think anyone who is passionate about their music needs to represent their shit right.

Enjoy.

1. Sub Focus - Rock It - Ram
>>>Q Project - Ask Not VIP - Advanced
2. Dillinja - Shiners - Valve
3. Serum vs. Northern Lights - Dangerous - Zombie
4. Break - Is This What You Want? VIP - Symmetry
5. Friction & K-Tee - Set It Off - Shogun Audio
6. Commix - Justified - Metalheadz
7. Calibre - Let Me Hold You - Signature
8. Icicle - Frozen - Renegade Hardware
9. Fresh - Fantasia - Digital Sound Boy
10. Zen - Dark Em Up - Grid
11. Danny Byrd - Red Mist VIP - Hospital
>>>Hazard - Killers Don't Die - Playaz
12. Chrissy Chris & Youngman MC - Kick Snare - V
13. Chimpo - Like No Other - Contagious
14. Jakes - Rock The Bells - Hench
15. Rusko - Mr Muscle - Sub Soldiers
16. Soulja Boy feat. Lil Wayne - Turn On My Swag (Remix) - Interscope
17. DZ - Old Timers - Black Acre
18. Liquid Wicked - Dubwar (Von D VIP Mix) - Destpub
19. MRK1 - Dubelek - Contagious
20. Skream - Memories of 3rd Base - Digital Sound Boy
21. Plastician - Export - White
22. MRK1 - Borderline - Contagious
23. Deadmau5 feat. Kaskade - I Remember (Caspa Remix) - Virgin
24. Mahanee vs. Von D - S.A.G.E. - Destpub
25. Giant - Rocker - Dub Police
26. The Art of Noise - Moments In Love (Caspa Remix) - White
27. Barbarix - Low Freqz - Aquatic Lab
28. Skream - Burnin' Up - Digital Sound Boy
29. 2 Bad Mice - Bombscare - Sm:)e Communications
30. La Roux - In For The Kill (Skream's Let's Get Ravey Remix) - White

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