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Sorry guys. Gonna go on a rant here, so if you cant be bothered stop reading here…

Ive been getting a lot of beef lately from some “true” heads. They are complaining that my sets have become too commercial, and that sometimes ill play underground tracks, and sometimes ill drop a hit and yada yada.

Whats so funny is. Last week i spoke to Mark Knight, and he is getting the same shit.

I rang him to have a chat about an upcoming release, but we ended up rambling on like two old farts.

Its seems to me that a lot of people frown upon hits, because they belong to the “true” underground.

Whats so funny is, that these days there is no underground anymore. Deep techno tracks, are outselling vocalhouse, and so on.

I love that when i ask these true heads what they like (when they dont like what im playing). They always seem to answer villalobos, sven vath and richie hawtin.

Dont misunderstand me. I have upmost respect for these artists, but i wouldnt actually define them as underground. Off course minimal is a different genre than house, but these days it is equally as commercial as house ever was.

Im missing djs, who actually mix genres. Im not talking eclectic djs, that play downbeat and chill, i would love to hear djs experiment a bit more.

Just a couple of years ago, the best djs would play everything from vocal house to techno, and it was absolutely fantastic.

I remember one of my best nights ever in a club, was listening to derrick may. He was playing his typical percussive techno at around 134 bpm. Then suddenly he drops a samba track. IM not talking a samba sample track, he drops a “live” samba track. Then he moves into an ambient record. Lets it play for 3 minutes, and then he drops a james brown record at around 114 bpm. Then he mixes in another tech recrds, and brings up the tempo on them both at the same time. And he did this on records, not cds. Needles to say the crown went nuts.

This was an absolute eye opener for me. Djs sets are about dynamics. There is nothing more boring than djs playing one genre all night.

These days a lot of djs are afraid of playing a wide set, because they are frightened that someone wont like what they do. WTF is that?!!!

For instance. We have a release of under the water coming up, and a lot of the reactions are, that people will support the dub mix, and not the vocal. This is one of best vocals of all time!!!!! why would one not play the vocal? I simply dont get it.

If it continues like this, we will end up with djs playing completely anonymous records, so that they are sure that they won offend anyone in the crowd.

Is that underground?????

I think the real underground is in taking chances. I salute djs, that want to play the music they like. Be it a phil collins records in the middle of a set, i dont care. If it feels right, then play it!!!!!!!