Weekly Dance 8/13/15 - Nearing the Beginning

Hey everyone, ALYXX here. Many apologies for being late on the post, getting busy over here as semester looms! This time I'm taking the liberty to show you around my current musical tastes, and hopefully you'll be able to get a feel for what to expect this coming semester when we go live! (In laymans terms, this is me going through my weekly music alottment and trying to turn a bit of laziness/business on my part into a productive postfor you guys, heh, but I really hope you'll be able to see that I dig around for stuff, not just stream the Beatport Top 10 or whatever else is up these days. Beatport? Junodownload anyone? :D )We're going to be getting the streaming station up and running soon for semester; I can't exactly comment on the exact date we're going live just yet, but be on the lookout! In no particular order: [soundcloud url="https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/217193295" params="color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false" width="100%" height="166" iframe="true" /]Nianaro - Abbey (Original Mix)I have to start with a trance track, it's where this all began basically. Well, in the form of a genre I could actually name at least (apparently my deeper roots lie with happy hardcore, but that's a story for another time...). I love what Nianaro has done with this track; it has the feel of an uplifting trance track (I can imagine the vocals already), but it's done in a progressive trance style. The way that all the elements tie together drive the track extremely well; I thought the track was steaming along at 135~136 before I double checked the BPM (it's 133). I wish it dropped a little harder, but definitely a great way to jump start into the euphoric sort of trance feel.   [soundcloud url="https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/216651855" params="color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false" width="100%" height="166" iframe="true" /]Who Killed Mickey & Zoolanda - Mental (Original Mix)And now jumping back to a recent favorite of mine, some Melbourne Bounce. If you haven't read the melbourne bounce article from a few weeks ago, you should go ahead and check it out! Short version, Melbourne is one of my favorite genres because it's like Big Room house, but more melodic; it has more of a groove underlying it that makes it so much more interesting. The track has the traditional, if not cliche, percussive looping buildups, but they drop straight into a deeper, yet somehow bigger groove led by the horns native to a Melbourne Bounce track. Breaking down again is still interesting; there's the ring of the signature Massive synths you'd hear in Big Room House, but chopped up and stylized. Altogether it's a massive, extremely fun track to come across in the library!  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIlHwqR1b2oDave202 feat. Yono - Golden Child (Club Mix)Other thing about my musical tastes: I'm a sucker for well executed, emotional vocals. Not much of a fan of the generic "3, 2, 1, GOOOO!" of Big Room to be honest, but it's not everyday that you get a vocal line that a) means something b) synergizes well with the song's structure c) rhymes like a good poem. And that's what Dave202 somehow manages to do in Golden Child. Wonderfully done lyrics here, and they're given ample room to shine thankfully without being smothered by a huge synth or other interruption in the background. When it kicks in, it doesn't disappoint though, with a bouncy, twangy drop helped by a tasteful application of percussive elements. Kind of reminds me of a Merk & Kremont track actually, minus the vowel synths!   [soundcloud url="https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/216543185" params="color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false" width="100%" height="166" iframe="true" /]Wiwek & Gregor Salto - Trouble (ft. MC Spyder) (Original Mix)When I said I didn't exactly like the "3,2,1, GOOO!" of Big Room, that didn't mean that I don't like Big Room though....There's a time and atmosphere for everything. That said, Trouble (ft. MC Spyder) isn't exactly Big Room, more of an interesting crossover between Big Room and Dancehall. It sounds like it would feel at home at the mid/down point of a Big Room set though, with a large, reverb filled, drum hammering drop. It's not as over the top / cheesy as some big room tracks go (see Warrior by Alvita, again, time and place for everything though!), and as a result puts the focus on the drum patterns and sample hits themselves. Something off the (literally) beaten path for once.   [soundcloud url="https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/217891922" params="color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false" width="100%" height="166" iframe="true" /]Now for something you guys probably haven't heard yet, I'm flippin loving Jackin' House actually. I'm not very well indoctrinated in the genre, though I really feel like I should. I read an article lately about how most people listening to "EDM" these days don't know where it all started; your average guitar enthusiast knows the likes of Led Zepplin, Bob Marley, the Beatles, etc., but no one knows the origins of techno, house, and the like, just the big names today. And the music going on today isn't anything what techno and house was like; today's music is more of a one off, single track does everything sort of deal, while techno and house were really meant to be mixed with their heavy evolving basslines and percussion/sample loops.And that's why I'm really taking a liking to Jackin' House in particular; it's meant to be mixed, and it's more fun than anything else I've tried mixing around with. You can think out your mix to a certain extent, but other times you can really just let the music itself take you for a ride as a DJ (assuming your timing and phrasing is on point!). It's insanely fun to be running two tracks simultaneously, then thinking that a third would sound really good with its vocal, then you think "what if I chopped up the vocal with the crossfader", throw in a delay, filter the mix up, punch the bass back in.....you get what I mean, I'll stop geeking out now :PBack to the track, Filterheadz really nails it with the bassline here, giving the track a senseless forward motion while the cowbell and reverb laden synths breathe an ethreal atmosphere into the track. All to bring it to a single, clear vocal sample, that drops back into the evolving beat. Just an immensely fun track to listen to on its own or backed by another. Make sure your sub is turned up though, otherwise you're missing 70% of the action.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LFsLlFYK09sMr. Belt & Wezol, Freejak - Somebody to Love (Original Mix)I still like the modern stuff though, and today that seems to be this thing called "Future House". I'm not sure whether it's exactly adhering to Deep House guidelines as it was originally, but it's got an upbeat, twangy little ring to it that's definitely infectious. Mr. Belt & Wezol plus Freejak do a delicious retake on Jefferson Airplane's "Somebody to Love", putting a cute, if not groovy future house rendition to the chorus. I'm sure this is the first time you're hearing "cute" describe a song, but that's honestly all I can think of. It's a fun, playful, clean redux of a classic track that everyone recognizes!  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4yBTK1in3QChimes - Pieces (Original Mix)Regardless of where I go in genre wise, I always like to come full circle into something uplifting and cheery, and Chimes does that perfectly with his single Pieces. A happy, peaceful vocal is given some room to breathe here before effortlessly dropping into a euphoric progressive style drop. The style reminds me a little of Coldplay's vocals for some reason...See Dash Berlin's Essential Mix of Coldplay's "Ticking Clocks" for more on that if you wish :)   [soundcloud url="https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/196151546" params="color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false" width="100%" height="166" iframe="true" /]Badd Dimes & We Are Loud Feat. Sonny Wilson - Light It Up (Original Mix)Ending on one of my favorite tracks of this year here. Badd Dimes and We Are Loud execute a big room house track like no other with Light It Up; it's got elements that aren't necessarily new in the genre, but everything resonates very well off each other and makes the track hard to forget! MC vocals aren't anything new in the genre, but there's a flow and cohesiveness to the words here as opposed to the usual "ARE YOU READY?!" yells that litter the genre as it stands. The lead into the build-up and drop are spot on, keeping you just on the tip of your toes before it hits, and the pronounced, melodic synth hits in the chorus (a little reminiscent of Melbourne I feel like) keep your focus locked in throughout. Fantastic!  Well, that's all I got for now. Hope you all enjoyed this weekly post about dance music; there's a good chance that I'll be doing more posts about this in the future (partially because I realize I'm going to start repeating "genre" related posts real soon if I keep this up), so look out for future posts going over my weekly digging for music. Weekly Dig I might call it? I'll figure it out. Thanks again for stopping by, and be on the lookout for the day when we go live once again this semester!