Summer Festival Season

As the summer progresses we of course enter the season of the outdoor party.  In an effort to collect some of the music that I think would sound great in an outdoor setting (and for those of you heading out to Suluk in August you will get to hear how this goes) I have compiled this mix of gritty tech house and dark progressive.  Just imagine it in the mountains at night away from all the city lights and you will have a good idea of where my head was when putting this set together.  I hope you all enjoy!

RobC

As a child, Matthew used to wake/annoy his family every morning by dragging a turntable out into the hallway and playing marching band records at full volume.  As an adult, not much has changed.  Matthew's musical tastes are simple: big basslines, stick-in-your-head melodies, and serious dancefloor sensibility.  As a resident of Area709's pure.prog and 709@Seven club nights alongside Mr. Curtis, Matthew has spent the past two years introducing Calgary to his unique blend of accessible underground music - and turning it up to eleven every chance he can.

This mix has been a long time coming and I am a bit surprised that I haven't had Matt guest on the Podcast until now.  The wait is over however, so sit back crank up the volume and enjoy this offering.


1. Nu Sensation - Go That Deep feat. Shara Nelson (Charles Webster Remix)
2. Lewie Day - Hermion
3. Booka Shade - Numbers (DJ Kicks Club Mix)
4. Andy Duguid feat. Leah - Don't Belong
5. Alexis - Twist in my Sobriety (Ali Payami Remix)
6. Brisker & Magitman vs. Moby - Next to the Brainiac (FIM's PB&C Pass)
7. D Ramirez & Mark Knight - Colombian Soul (Gabriel &  Dresden's Tuscan Soul Reconstruction)
8. Kaskade - 4AM (Adam K & Soha Mix)
9a. Ned Shepard and Sultan and Maher Daniel - Itajai Vibes (16 Bit Lolitas Remix)
9b. Fragma - Toca Me (Inpetto 2008 Remix)
10. Sergej Fresh feat. Koshka Touvan - Lucky Fish
11. Arnej - Rendezvous (Destination Unknown)
12. Sultan & Ned Shepard feat. Kuba - Jeopardy (Ohms Dub Mix)
13. Jaren, Cerf & Mitiska - Me & You
14. Ashley Wallbridge - New Moonlight

My first official guest DJ at the Textures Club night down at Amsterdamn Rhino Josh Miller is up this month with a wickedly progressive set a la Sasha and Diggers back around '99.

Josh's Comments follow:

When Rob asked me to open for his first night at the Amsterdam Rhino I was pretty excited.  Then I realized I hadn't played out in several years and I should probably get my sh*t together...  All that biking, skiing not to mention work have really cut into the DJ'ing time as of late, so it was a great incentive to get back into it!  

Then I got to thinking "you know Josh, you just bought that fancy new Macbook.  Why not buy a midi controller and put that thing to use"  So, I proceeded to get Ableton Live and get to work.  Now for those of you who aren't familiar with Ableton, it's a fantastic program that allows you to play multiple tracks and loops, add lots of effects and generally have as much control over the music as you can dream up.  The upside - the ability to go beyond the track and not having to beatmatch (I hope after nearly 10 years of playing records I don't have to prove to people that I can mix).  The downside - concentration central.   Playing this set took FAR more concentration and work than had I just played CD's, and it wouldn't have come with a bunch of the fun add ons.  The real issue is that I didn't get a chance to drink my beer often enough =)  All in all, it's a pretty fun way to play music.  Not sure I would want to play that way all the time, but I'm definitely going to continue to explore it for a while.

This set is basically the same as what I played at the Rhino to open up for Rob.  It's starts off pretty chill, then I took it techy for a while before getting into more rippin' progressive.  The people that were in the basement that night seemed pretty into it - so I hope you enjoy too!

Josh.
yoshmiller @ gmail . com

Track Listing
1. Powerplant - Overcast (Jay Tripwire remix)
2. Bongo Man - Bites (Tech edit)
3. Lesvicon Soul - The One (Nic Lerner remix)
4. Bongo Man - Guranga
5. Terry Francis and Haris - Smiling and Smiling
6. Mighty Dub Katz - Guaguanco (Tom Middleton Deep Dub)
7. Bongo Man - The Truth
8. Visitor
9. Kenneth Graham
10. The Producers - Influx
11. Prompt - Evolve
12. James Zabiela - Human (JMIL edit)
13. The Producers - Shakin Dub
14. Jamayka
15. The Real Jazz
16. H Foundation - Chic-O-Laa
17. John Acquaviva - No Fear (Trick and Kubic remix)
18. Todd Terry - I'm Feeling It (JMIL edit)
19. Jem Stone and J.C. - Disco Daze
20. Alcatraz - Giv Me Luv (Dean Coleman remix)
21. Jeff Bennett - Trial Problems (Kriece remix)
22. Viscid- Crazy (Tony Tomas remix - JMIL edit)
23. Jay Tripwire + Grant Dell - Purdy Mouth (Stephan Brandt mix)
24. Bongo Man - Swinging It
25. Space Safari - Burning (JMIL edit)
26. Bongo Man - Chaser
27. John Dahlback - Blink (D.O.N.S. & DBN Chainsaw remix)
28. Burufunk - Community Funk (Deadmau5 remix)

Here is a little bonus for you all.  I put this mix together for Wes' radio show and thought "What the hell, I might as well post it to the podcast too!"  So here you go!  Tons of great old tracks in here too as I have been collecting these for a while.  Enjoy.

Tracklisting

01. Pablo Roma - Sad Flowers (Dynamic Illusion Intro Mix)
02. Coldfish - Cycles
03. Claude Von Stroke - Who's Afraid of Detroit (Stanton Warriors Mix)
04. Petter - Six Songs (Tone Diary Mix)
05. Bedrock - Forge
06. Luke Chable - Melburn
07. Beber & Tamra - You Wonder (Starecase Vocal Mix)
08. Ivan Frolov - Cloudy 2007 (Hypnotic Breaks Mix)
09. Pole Folder & CP - Dust (Fretwell Mix)
10. Brahma & Drew Nichols - Submerged (Madoka Alternate Generation Mix)

Wes has been my co-resident at Amsterdam Rhino for over a year now and so it is surprising that I have not gotten him on the podcast until now.  Wes prides himself on weaving together many styles of music even going so far as to play Psy-trance on occasion.  He is also the man behind the success Area709.com website which features a host of DJs and Producers with articles, bios and a ton of mix set to scope out.  What follows is the result of a mix exchange that Wes and I agreed to a while back and finally got around to doing.

Enjoy!

Tracklisting

Happy New Year!

Well so I was supposed to have another live set for you this month, this time from the new years eve show that I was supposed to play.  Unfortunately the show got cancelled last minute which sucked!  Anyways, as a consolation I have put together a mix consisting of many of the tracks that I was taking to the show.  This mix comprises a great selection of old records that I have been meticulously transcribing to digital form.  This has been a really exciting project for me as there are some excellent tracks that I had all but forgotten I had!  So sit back and enjoy this selection of music that I have just rediscovered.

Tracklisting:
01) Joe T Vanelli - Prelude
02) Swayzak - State Of Grace
03) Greed - Strange World (Lemon 8 Mix)
04) Minilogue - Little Sisters
05) Quivver - Dancing In Dark Rooms (Quivver Dub)
06) Big Pig - Breakaway (Chris Fraser Mix)
07) Glen Morrison - Circles
08) Nick Muir - Savin' You
09) Infusion - Legacy (Junkie XL Mix)
10) Snake Sedrick - Mirage (Intro)
11) Quivver - These Are The Days (Vocal Mix)

More great news for all you folks who enjoy the podcast and are in Calgary. I have be able to negotiate a night dedicated to the show! This night will only happen 4 times a year for now while I build up support and will be a great opportunity for those of you who I don't already know to come out and say hi.

The night will be held at Amsterdam Rhino where I currently hold a residency at Pure:Prog. The beautiful thing about this set up is that the Textures night will happen the friday after the Pure:Prog night so you can all get a double dose of good progressive two fridays in a row!

Plus in addition to this I will be recording each show and airing portions of it on the podcast so you can come down enjoy the music and then take it home with you. So be sure to check out the first installment of Textures Live on February 29th (Leap Year Hoorah!).

I will post more details about these events (guest DJ appearances etc.) as the dates get closer.

The 2008 Schedule will be as follows:

February 29th - Inauguration

May 30th

August 29th

November 28th

This set come live from my residency at Amsterdam Rhino and features my very first Ableton Live mix set.  I've spent some time getting to know the software and decided to give it a try at the Rhino last month.  It was a great night with an awesome group there getting down.  The set spans a very wide spectrum of music with some Tech House, Electro and prog as well as some things that were down right Trancy!  I all went over well and I'd like to thank all the folks who came out and gave their support down in the dungeon at the Rhino.  I will post the tracklisting for this mix soon but I need to track down a couple of track names first.  In the mean time enjoy this set and please give me any feedback on what worked (or didn't work) as I am still getting the hang of this Ableton thing.

Cheers and happy holidays!

RobC

Here it is, the new look and feel of the podcast!  I know it has been a long time since any of you got a new episode and well... I've not just been sitting on my arse.  Some traveling, some beer drinking in exotic locales, some hard drive failures and a general rethinking of what I'm doing has brought us here to the new and improved podcast - Textures.  Presented by yours truly and still committed to bringing you all the very best in electronic music of all types.  I have added new graphics care of Area709, a new intro sequence and coming soon some dialog intros to the mixes as they come out.  I hope you all enjoy this more professional looking and sounding show and I look forward to growing our audience in the months to come.  And as always, pass this along to other like minded peeps out there and share the love!

To kick off Textures, I have a mix from a good friend of mine.  He has been DJing forever as far as I can tell.  He has opened for every major DJ you can think of and has retained a sought after spot on the Balance Record pool for years.  He is perhaps the god-father of Progressive in Calgary and just an amazing person in general.  I hope you enjoy this live mix from none other than Cary Chang!

Rob C

From Cary:

I am going to come at this bio thing from another perspective cause generally I find bio's thoroughly un-interesting and self aggrandizing at best. If anyone is at all interested they can check my site - but even that bio is sort of weak. I will however share some stories that are pertinent to this mix!

This mix is a piece of my warm up set for our Sander Kleinenberg show at Tantra nightclub. This was the second time I played with Sander - and my story comes from the first which must have been around 2001, just as his Global Underground mixes started to come out - and in the slump of our local scene. I had been playing to a very very slow warm up crowd - lethargy pervaded and the trainspotters were out in full effect - not a good equation to warming up a dance floor for a dj I couldn't wait to see! The sound of the time was a very boring era of progressive - the dark tribal days and I was in an area I was calling Nu.House - a very open interpretation of what fits together - more clubby then progressive house was known to be, but also more divergent - playing more techno, break beats - really pushing different things into one place. Needless to say - the crowd was not really sure of what to make of me. Sander had been in the club long enough to drop his record bags - and run to get some drinks - probably talk to some girls.. that's what all guest dj's do right? .... well I have all these trainspotters probably tearing me apart in their heads, no dance floor to speak of - and Sander comes running over asking if he can buy the last two records - having owned a shop, the records themselves are no big deal to me.. but in jest I said I couldn't accept his money and that instead I would trade him... He promptly opened his bag - tore through it and handed my back four of five new promos. The trainspotters jaws were on the floor and I felt totally vindicated! To be honest - it has been interactions like this that remind me of the true community of people who just love dance music!

of special note on this mix - due to Sander's tour, we were playing on the new an unreleased Pioneer SVM 1000 mixer - I am rarely intimidated when I get into a club or booth - but this thing made me sit back and look for five minutes before I did anything - a real pleasure and a highlight of the show! check this thing out, it will blow your mind.

Anyways - thank you for giving me the opportunity to share my mix with your listeners - sorry its like three years over due - and I look forward to our mountain biking season in the coming year bro!

Hi all,

I know you are all wondering "What the hell happened?".  It has been damn near 6 months since a new episode was posted.  I know, I know!  I have been rethinking how I want to do the podcast and fear not.  I am not abandoning you all and giving up or anything crazy like that!  No far from it. I am in the process of spicing things up a notch, giving the 'Cast a shot from my spice weasel *BAM!*

I will be posting new material soon and the 'Cast will be getting a major overhaul.  New name, new logo, a nice intro bit and even a bit of actual dialogue from yours truly.  So i'm going for a more professional slant on this one and hopefully you all enjoy the new look and sound of "Textures" brought to you by Rob Curtis!