funky fresh

fresh-faced and funkadelic, Mat Zo is the magic man for tons of reasons - you just gotta let your ears do a little listening. The past 2 weeks he's given us even more fuel for our (at least my) burning zo fever. I linked below why..

1. Ministry of Sound - 27th October Saturday Sessions: Exclusive Mix

http://soundcloud.com/mat_zo/mat-zo-mos

He released this today as a warm-up mix for his set this Saturday (October 27th) w/ Porter Robinson at Ministry of Sound. I'd probably get up on a table, fist pump and double fist doubles all night long at this show...wait a minute, I already DID do that when they were both in Edmonton #yeg last spring. This set is good for a number of, albeit different, reasons. The shortest way I can put it is it's bassy, its fast, and it does exactly what its suppose to do - "warm you up". Plus I love Zedd's "Shave it", so its pretty spot-on in my books. 

2. Mat Zo's India Mix

http://soundcloud.com/mat_zo/mat-zo-india-mix

Exactly a week before he released his MOS exclusive mix, he posted this little nugget of gold. The only problem I can find with this mix is that it's only 30 minutes long. Set to be a warm-up for his set during Trance Around The World #450 (November 10th), it proves yet again why he's so good. It's original, its funky and its trance music. Funky and trance don't go together, like Aoki and Armin, water and oil, cheese and carrots. They don't belong in the same listen, and he somehow makes it work. I was groovin' for the first 10, feeling those typical "trance-tugging" emotional hiccups in the middle and back to kick-stepping by the end. THAT'S why Mat Zo is a genius - he's creative, he's unpredictable. 

TRACKLIST:

1 - Minimow - Bollyhouse

2 - Eric Sneo & Chris the voice - Shut up and dance

3 - Tomaz & Filterheads - Sunshine

4 - Tritonal - Utopia (Arty remix)

5 - Alex Kenji - No matter what they say

6 - Eco with Breakfast - Wide Open (Johan Malmgren Remix)

7 - Chocolate Puma & Gregor Salto - Gimme Sum

8 - Bing Players & Ferry Cprsten - Get on the Move Punk (Arty Rock-n-rolla Mix) (Mat Zo Mashup)

9 - Mat Zo - Bipolar

10 - Walck - Rise up

3: Above & Beyond: TRANCE AROUND THE WORLD 400.5 (Mat Zo)

http://www.djmix.com/2011/12/above-beyond-trance-around-the-world-400-5-mat-zo

Just a refresher - remember when Mat Zo blew our minds for TATW 400.5?....I don't know about you, but I didn't see this mix coming. This should be an even better warm-up for November 10th....this is what music is suppose to sound like right here. 

I'm telling you friends, I'm on to something here. If by some strange, MESSED UP reason your not already listening to this kid, then please do yourself a favor and turn him on and up. When I here his stuff I'm physically forced into sharing it with others so everyone can have a taste of this guy's greatness. I'm not just a fan girl spreading the love - I love music and I especially love creative, funky, groovy, jazzy, bassy beats and if you want to expand your horizons, expand them through this guy. 

WORD, meow and enjoy. 

a list for Smith.

Mike Smith, the father of such notable  phrases like "that beat was so dirty, someone needs to mop the floor" and "team work makes the dream work, baby", has requested a list of new tunes for him to dirty floors with. So it lays a bit of contextual background for my choices - I had to find only tunes that I could see being spilt, spread, dropped, tossed, hucked, or thrown on the floor and these tunes would need to cause the floor to be so dirty afterwards that Mr. Smith would need to bust out a mop and do a little house cleaning. 

Be warned, and be armed with a mop.

Post floor mopping.

(5) Yves V vs Dani L Mebius - Chained (Original Mix)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvAldipJQ4I

(4) Juventa & Johnny Yono - The Machine (original mix)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNZkCxKN8z8

(3) Kill The Buz - Party Hard

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-C9jhFIc1jg

(2) Nicky Romero & Calvin Harris - Iron 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBeemZIACJI

(1) Sub Focus - Out of the Blue (Laidback Luke Remix)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Q-qarI7NEg

**This is all straight electro house, be forewarned. 

mash-up mania

Remember that set I posted the other day on Facebook, the Myon and Shane 54 set from 2009 which made all ears bow before the Hungarian masterminds!? Well I found another one, rather my tweeting counterparts did....circa 2011.

http://soundcloud.com/myon-and-shane-yearmix/myon-and-shane-54

And like always, you can thank me later, meow.

If you don't like arty, Lange, Zo, Yochen Miller, basically everything that was right musically with 2011...then don't bother with this set. 

5, 6, SEVEN LIONS.

I'll be the first to admit it - I don't know nearly as much as I'd like to know about "classifying genre's" and all that shit. Sure, give me some house, dub step, electro, progressive, trance, yeah piece of cake, no problem, give me 5 seconds and I'll tell you what heading it falls under almost immediately. But then it gets tricky...You don't just need to know what giant classifier a certain track falls underneath, there are specific sub-types underneath the first large umbrella, like euro-trance, acid-trance, vocal-trance (okay, that ones easy), uplifting trance, etc....give me a break. I guess I'm suppose to know this stuff, but I don't. And I know people that do know this stuff and it blows me away...maybe I should learn? 

Check out urban dictionary's "definitions" of trance, lol.

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=trance

Either way, that's besides the point. The point is I'm obsessed with SEVEN LIONS. I don't like Skrillex, and dubstep usually makes me want to stick my head inside an oven, Shambhala was definintly one of those "I'm here for the community and experience not necessarily the bass-womping music" type of situations, and usually when I think of dub in any kind of way, I want to shake my head, pop an advil and call 'er a day. 

***NOTE however that I do make exceptions. For example, DIRTYLOUD has had this weird hold on me for awhile now, their dirty, their bassy, and when they break down some dubstep I can't get enough. I think their so talented.  So that being said, I make exceptions, not always ones I can explain, but when my little ears like something, they like something. Hell, even at Pure in #yeg I got down to a little Hardstyle, which is an even stranger concept to wrap your mind around then me and dubstep. 

I think I've made 2 points here; one, I can't always classify a song into a genre and I'm not totally sure if its an important ability to even have (although I'm open to learning), and secondly dubstep and me are like oil and water (no mixing). Getting me to listen to electro or trance isn't hard and getting me to like it usually isn't very difficult either. But when I listen to a genre I can classify, and I've classified it as something I don't like and yet I do, in fact like it - Now THAT'S great. 

I think it's actually kind of funny how pigeon-holed some people can become in their tastes and artist preferences, unwilling to ever step out and try something new. Yeah, you like that new Armin song? Big surprise, seeing as how you've got ASOT tattoo's on your forearms and you've seen him the 17 times he's been in your city and "he's your God"....give me a break. It makes Armin special when he grabs a fan and maintains one, yes. What would make Armin REALLY special is if he grabbed the dirtiest dub, glitch-hop fan there was and made them fall in love with trance and what he does as a producer. (I love Armin and I'm not ripping him up, I think hes a genius but I also love trance so I think that alone proves my point). 

What I'm trying to say is that I think SEVEN LIONS is brilliant because he is doing something for me as a listener that doesn't happen all the time - I'm beginning to like something I normally wouldn't. This guy doesn't even have a wikapedia page yet, he only has like 3000 some followers on twitter and I just can't understand it......what he does is take trance songs I already know and love, infuse them with what apparently is called "progressive dubstep" and BLOW, MY, MIND. Anyways, he's got a soundcloud, and I'm officially stalking anything he's remixing lately, also go like him on facebook - makes for immediate finds of new tunes! Below, I've listed my favorites so far.....check-check-check it out. 

I feel like anyone at all that likes "dubstep" or "progressive dubstep" or whatever you want to call it MUST know of this guy right, so maybe I'm just stumbling on to the scene late with this one, but maybe not. Listen and love this guy, for real, and then thank me later. Meowwwww.

Paul van Dyk - I Don't Deserve You (Seven Lions Remix) - Radio Edit

http://soundcloud.com/seven-lions/paul-van-dyk-i-dont-deserve-1?utm_campaign=timeline&utm_content=http%3A%2F%2Fsoundcloud.com%2Fseven-lions%2Fpaul-van-dyk-i-dont-deserve-1&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=soundcloud

Oceanlab - Satellite (Seven Lions Mix)

http://soundcloud.com/obeythismusic/oceanlab-satellite-seven-lions?utm_campaign=timeline&utm_content=http%3A%2F%2Fsoundcloud.com%2Fobeythismusic%2Foceanlab-satellite-seven-lions&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=soundcloud#_=_

Seven Lions - Below Us (feat. Shaz Sparks)

http://soundcloud.com/iiiapuk/seven-lions-below-us-feat-shaz?utm_campaign=timeline&utm_content=http%3A%2F%2Fsoundcloud.com%2Fiiiapuk%2Fseven-lions-below-us-feat-shaz&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=soundcloud#_=_

Tritonal - Still With Me Feat. Christina Soto (Seven Lions Mix)

http://soundcloud.com/seven-lions/tritonal-still-with-me-feat-1?utm_campaign=timeline&utm_content=http%3A%2F%2Fsoundcloud.com%2Fseven-lions%2Ftritonal-still-with-me-feat-1&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=soundcloud#_=_

embrace your EDM family.

I think sometimes I forget how important music is, in terms of bringing people together. I've had the pleasure of meeting a lot of people through music, be it the shows I've gone to, or just cruising #trancefamily hashtags on twitter. It's nice to know that there are others out there that feel the same connection with music that I do. When you discover a song and you can feel the words to your very core, words that ring true to how you feel at that very moment, or how you've felt in the past. When you feel a drop in a track that brings actual shivers to your spine...I know for a fact that I'm not the only one that feels the intense rush TRANCE brings to the heart, to the mind. Music brings us TOGETHER. I am so blessed to have a family of friends that enjoy music as much as I do as well. To have an environment of friends around me to share music and passion with is a blessing. And every single time I meet someone new in my life that shares the same obsession with music I do, I can't help but get excited. When I hear a track that's done something exciting, and it resonates in my heart or I discover a new song and its on my mind until I've at least shared it with ONE other person, and then I meet someone who suffers from the same symptoms of "music love" that I do, THAT gets me going! 

Specific to EDMONTON - I want to remind all my friends and everyone who calls the city of champions home - EMBRACE whats going on in our city. For every fan boy that's just going to the next Boodang show to drop some E and get messed up and every bandwagoner that is simply there for the party, remember there is someone else who is there for that same feeling I'm speaking about. There are those who love music, and then there are those who love getting fucked up to music -embrace those who are like minded in your love of music and enjoy it TOGETHER. Share music, share DJ's, share some god damn discoveries. And even though I'll be the first to say the amount of shows is becoming totally redundant (I'm currently "invited" to 14 shows in the next 2 months on facebook) and the "money-grab" that EDM is starting to resemble in our city is scary - at least we have the opportunity to see artists other cities and other fans don't have. I'd rather 14 shows to go to then none at all. EMBRACE the family around you that feels the same thing you do when your alone cruising your old In Search of Sunrise albums or downloading AOKI (I hope that's not the case but I refuse to judge)...whatever gets you going, as long as its music that makes you feel what I feel, its doing something right. 

WORD.

ANYWAYS - Here are some TRACKS that have been on my mind and iPod the past few weeks that'll I'll share with you. 

MORGAN PAGE feat NADIA ALI - CARRY ME 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Janwt72x4Ks\

DJ ECO - DESERT SONG      
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Janwt72x4Ks

REX MUNDI - MENCE      (This ones so dark, I love it)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gu-twZzT0xs

CASSANDRA FOX - TOUCH ME (MS54 REMIX) 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxMGG_J80Sw

TENISHA -  WHERE DO WE BEGIN (Andrew Rayel Remix)  (best track of last week, hands down)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ORFN_52s8M

ARMIN - I'LL LISTEN (Super8 & Tab Remix)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8hceuAI6jg

TIESTO & ALLURE - PAIR OF DICE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boGCwYr4M00

DINKA - POLARITY   (I'm proud of this find) :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6Wmi_Ivwtk

Leon Bolier & Alex Kenji - Trumpets (Original Mix)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgtzrXLyPws

SEBASTIAN INGROSSO & TOMMY TRASH - RELOAD
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjI2CHup07M

HARDWELL VS ABOVE AND BEYOND - THING CALLED SPACEMAN (W&W MASHUP)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUwTiMuh-BA