On this page, I'll try to explain you why I love deejay-ing so much, what I had in mind when I started
and what made me as I am today. I know this is not the most interesting piece of litterature, but anyway,
here is the true story. I didn't enlighten the truth, so you'll see it's a mix of disappointment and
joy.
First introduction to music
When I was 6, I used to attend a wednesday-afternoon activity about computers, programming and
robotics. It was an introduction to scripting, with a computer-driven robotic turtle. It was like
an RC car, except the remote was the computer and it was much more slower and accurate. It was so
captivating for the child I was, I learned LOGO which was my first programming language. You could
for example write "FW 100, LT 120, FW 100, LT 120, FW 100" and it would draw a triangle, because it
had a pen under it.
One day, the teacher who used to give these lessons left the school. As we were living in an apartment
by then, staying at home on wednesday afternoon as a child was pretty boring. There were a few
other activities available, like art (drawing and sculpture), sport, and music. I choosed music by
default, just because I never liked sport and the art was taught by the father of a girl i was fighting
with all the time (hey we were kids... if you read me Noemie, write me :)).
So then, i was playing music on my wednesday afternoons. I learned to play Xylophone, soprano
recorder and so on. One day, the teacher played a song I really liked. I was pretending to sleep
on my desk to show that it was really nice and that I enjoyed it, but as you may guess, she took
it the other way around, she thought I was bored. She expelled me from the class, and she talked
to my parents, saying she couldn't learn me anything else, and that maybe I could go to music
school to learn music more deeply.
The music school of terror
When you're 9 and your parents ask you whether you want to go to music school instead on wednesday
afternoon or not, you don't know what you run into. So i replied something like... "eeeeh... yes?", and some
time after that I was sitting on a chair in the first year of music class.
They skipped the first two "introduction" years because I already had music lessons for some time.
I remember that I missed the
first lesson, and that I was so scared and impressed when I came to the second lesson that I had to
borrow a classmate's classbook and I even copied his handwriting (I didn't knew if it was required).
At the same time, I started following soprano recorder private lessons. This music instrument
followed me for 9 years in total... my flute teacher was a strong guy always going mad and yelling at
me when I didn't make my exercises or when I made errors (it happenned all the time, but not enough
to make someone normal mad). So I was really afraid of attending the lessons.
From time to time, there were little concerts in front of the parents, sometime it even counted
to pass to the next class. I really hated these concerts. Being in front of the people, I was shaking,
stressing, I was thinking "what do they think, will they have to look at me for another hour?". Really,
I couldn't cope with these concerts, I hated being in front of people, playing music for them. Now, you
know why I told you about the music school stuff, and i'll be back to it later.
Hooked on dance music
At the same moment that I started music school, I discovered eurodance. It is so full of joy,
energy and synths that I really loved it. I was recording the songs that played on radio on tapes, and
listening to these tapes until they worn off.
While listening to the radio, I also started listening to the radio shows in the evening, those
for teenagers mainly, that talk about s*x and so on. The radio presenter (Max, not to mention him)
was such a star behind his mike that I was one of these children that play the radio presenter, faking
the voice of listeners to solve their imaginary problem, recording the whole show on tapes, with
teddybears behind boxes as colleagues. Becoming one of these guys working for the radio was one of
my dreams, I didn't know it would happen one day.
I was 13 when i bought my first CD. Well, in fact it was the second one, but
I don't want to tell you which one was the first one I ever bought, as i'm not
in love with Ginger Spice anymore. So let's admit we're talking about the first CD.
I was at home, and I heard a really, really cool melody outside. A neighbour was
fixing his car's stereo and that track was playing on the radio... It took some
days before I could find what it was, and I immediately ran to the music shop to
by that CD... "Sash - Stay!". I bought his album, in fact, cause I knew "Ecuador"
and "Encore une fois" as well. I was soooo in love with that album... I can't
even listen to it anymore, cause I took that CD everywhere with me and it has
more scratches than... mmm... whatever has a lot of scratches.
Napster's golden age
I was 15 when I downloaded Napster for the first time. For those who forgot,
it was the first peer-to-peer music sharing program ever (correct me if I'm wrong).
As it was the first one, it was the only one so far, and everything was on it!
Then I started looking for the tracks I heard on the radio. I discovered a lot
of artists while looking for "techno", thanks to people like me by then who sorted
Trance as Techno.
A few friends of mine told me about a guy called Tiesto, another one called
Paul van Dyk, a crazy female DJ called DJ Irene, and so on... and from mix to
remix I realised that what I really loved was Trance, in every flavour. Euro-trance
Hard-trance, ... I was discovering a world of music that made me euphoric. Most
of my classmates were listening to black metal, so I was kind of uncomprehended...
except by a few ones, girls mainly, who liked this kind of music.
Flash Jordan the Light-Master
We were leaving for the weekend with our class, and two friends
of mine were taking care of the music. As I was kind of an electronics passionate,
I proposed to bring a self-made light organ for the party. It was a Veleman-kit
I bought and built some time before. It had 16 different blinking modes, and
I was doing the light-jockey with it, changing the programs on the most appropriate
moment. My first scene nickname was "Flash Jordan".... because I also had a little
20 Watts strobe.
My friends didn't have a mixer either, they were using the fact that their
amplifier had a source switch with buttons, and when you pressed two buttons
at the same time you heard both sources... and they were using that to avoid
silence. I even "mixed" two tracks myself when they left to have a beer! (whoa,
we were allowed to have a beer!!)
First mix ever... and Trance Mutation 001!
One day, I woke up with a trance melody in my head. I wanted to make a real
song out of it, but obviously I didn't know how. I searched on the internet for
a music production software and I found Sonic Foundry Vegas Audio (now known as
Sony Vegas). As a matter of fact, it wasn't made to produce a song, but rather
to sequence audio tracks. I found out that it was possible to change the pitch
of a track... and I made my first mix in Vegas! I already tried before to mix
on the computer, but by then we hadn't simple programs like AtomixMP3, Virtual
DJ and so on; so my first "clean" mix was made with Vegas!
A few classmates were asking for mixtapes, that I did. I also had a guy on
ICQ, coming from Canada and called Masterdex (F., if you ever read
me... write to me!) who asked for a mix when I said I was training to mix. He
made a playlist, and he asked me to mix it, which I did. We together agreed to
call it "Trance Mutation"... after searching for quite a lot of expressions with
"Trance" in it, because it was mainly trance in that mix. The first Trance Mutation
was done. Unfortunately, I lost the MP3 in one of my disk crashes.
First parties, first eargasms
Then, I began to understand the real basics of beatmixing. I hadn't money
to buy one of those CD players with a pitch control, so I put two soundcards
in my computer and I received a mixer for christmas from my parents. I had my
first parties with friends, I was bringing my computer with me everytime :)
I keep the best memories from a party when I was 17, it was after the exams,
in a unused warehouse owned by the uncle of a classmate. I played house, R n' B,
drum and bass and trance. I remember a hundred people yelling on "Push - Universal
Nation (Ferry Corsten remix)", during the big buildup, with strobes blinking at
max power.... It was suuuch a thrill, I had goosebumps, I didn't knew where I
were for a few seconds, it was like a real orgasm (except nothing happened
below ... you know). I keep being emo every time I think of that moment!
Turntables lessons
At 16, I was introduced for the first time to the Technics SL1200 MK2
turntables that a "friend" owned. For those who don't know, these turntables
are the most common and powerful turntable used. They are really great. But
anyway, it took quite a long time to me to learn to beatmatch. Almost one year
and an half. I was 18 when I began to be able to synchronise two tracks on vinyl.
Then, another friend bought turntables, and I was missing lessons at the
university to train at his place three times a week. I mixed Trance Mutation 8,
then 9, and yes, there were Trance Mutation from 2 to 7 as well, but you don't
want me to write a book over every single mix I do, do you?
Producing apartment-trance
One day, I found a demo of Propellerheads Reason... and I loaded an example
file that I knew because I had the mp3 back in the "napster" age. And I was there,
sitting in front of my screen, seeing all the notes being played by Reason,
following the parts, and I cried of Joy, thanking god and Propellerheads for
editing a software which allows people to make pro-sounding music. It meant that
I potentially could make a commercial track!
It wasn't as easy as it sounded, because yeah... you have to know how to use
it, learn how to produce, learn to make it sound pro and even today I can't say
I finished with the learning. I was so disappointed by my tracks that I thought
that I'd never manage to produce almost-pro sounding material, and I called my
genre by then "apartment-trance". It meant that you could listen to it at home,
but it wouldn't work on the radio or in parties.
Trance Energy
While searching for Trance Videos on multimedia-sharing programs, I found a
video of Mauro Picotto mixing at Trance Energy. It was only 20 minutes long or
so, but on top of the fact that I really loved Mauro Picotto, I was amazed by
the ambiance of the party, the awesome light/laser show and so on... not to
talk about the sexy party-girls all around the place!.
I said "Wow, I want to go there!!". A few months later, the tickets were
booked for the next edition of Trance Energy. A few friends of mine and I were
going by car to the Netherlands to attend the 2003 edition, which happened to
be the 10 years birthday of Trance Energy as well! The lineup sounded promising,
with DJ Jean, Tomcraft, Cygnus X, Joop, Johan Gielen, Cosmic Gate, Cor Fijneman,
Marcel Woods, Kai Tracid, Bas & Ram, Jose, G-Spott and Mark van Dale among
others.
That was one of my most crazy parties ever attended. After some time, when
I was ten meters away from Kai Tracid, with two lasers drawing grids over my head,
surrounded by hot girls in bikini, and I cried of Joy. Really, all of this was
so new and fantastic to me that I went emo about it. The music was so great!
The DJ that really made my day was Johan Gielen, his set was so nice that I
was dancing like crazy on the dance floor.
This experience obviously inspired me to keep on producing, and mixing. One
of my dreams would be to be the other side of the grid, on the scene, spinning
for such a crazy audience on such a fat soundsystem, with one of these awesome
lightshows!
The Subtraxx Experience
The first guy who ever helped me producing was
Torsten Fassbender.
He told me how to improve my sound, gave me a few samples, and he even mastered
a track of mine, my first "acceptable" trance track (even if it sucks now... ho
you know what, i feel like hearing it again! *listens* mmh... it sucks indeed,
but it had some good ideas in there). I am really thankful for all the time he
spent learning me a few key tricks of trance!
Torsten then introduced me to the Subtraxx Collective, they were producers who share tips and
tricks and review each other's productions on a forum, called the Subtraxx Forum.
With Torsten's help and paying a lot of attention to other's work, I did some
tracks and posted one of them on the forum.
One of those members of the Subtraxx crew was Giorgio Ponticelli, an Italian
Trance producer who was running a show on Digitally Imported Radio, mixing the
best tracks he could find on the forum in that show. Giorgio didn't disliked
Jordan's track to much, so he put it in A-List. Basically, A-list means that
the track will get airplay, B-list are the maybe's, and C-list is when it
doesn't appeal to Giorgio at all. Following my first track, I did some other ones.
Over one year, around 6 tracks of mine were played in the Subtraxx Experience,
on Digitally Imported.
Guestmixing on Digitally Imported
I made a mix with some uplifting tracks I knew, as well as some unsigned tracks
from the Subtraxx forum, with no intent to spread that mix, it was just one of
these training mixes I use to record for years, so I can listen to it afterwards
and notice my errors and try to improve myself.
As I was listening to it again, I thought it was decent, and as I was chatting
with Giorgio on MSN I sent him the set over so he could have some music while he
was in the train like every morning. I wasn't expecting at all that he came back
to me a few days after that saying "it's quite good, would you like to do a mix
for Digitally Imported?". I was listening to DI for almost four years, so I was
very enthusiatic to that idea!
While the mix was playing, in the third hour of the Subtraxx Experience where
guest DJ's used to play, i was watching DI forums... and they were all so nice
and encouraging! These people really made my day!
Intenz City, or How to loose money for dummies
With a few friends of mine, we were thinking that there were not enough Trance
parties in Brussels. In fact, not even a single clothes shop play trance here in
Brussels. So we decided to build our own event. We rented a boat, a huge soundsystem,
we booked DJ's, we sorted out the rights, we printed flyers and did some interviews
on local radio stations to try to bring people... but guess what, we only did 50
entrances.
We had invested a lot in the party, but there were a few problems that prevented
people from coming there. Retrospectively, the main one was that a free-party was
organised a few meters away from the boat where we were organizing it, and it was
only communicated a few days before, although the organizers knew we were doing
that event there that night. Some other lessons we learned were the flyers that
were ugly, the posters that were too small, and no big big names in the lineup.
Maybe we could have organized it somewhere else, because the place was expensive,
ugly and the neighbourhood wasn't that good.
Although we lost money and were quite disappointed, I think I learned a
lot with this experience. Most important than everything, I gave its chance to
an unknown DJ to spin and he did an awesome job, and became my best friend.
Carmelo alias Karl was banging the techno room for almost one hour, and the 50
people there were dancing and yelling during his whole performance. Since then,
Karl also taught me a lot of techniques and we really help each other the most
we can.
Boring House Music Business
Some months after that, a friend was organizing an event in the Louise Gallery
event hall, in october. He liked my trance mixes, so he had quite some faith in
me and asked me if I would like to spin there. I immediately said yes. We then
both aggreed that Trance just wouldn't do there, so I had to play house. I had
like four months to learn house!
As a young unexperienced deejay, when you're asked to do a two hours-set,
you prepare every single transition. You know your tracklist by hearth, and
you have like a "static" set which you can't adapt to your crowd. That's a
beginner's error, but it happened to every single DJ... including me.
While my turn was coming, i was eating my fingernails. I was SO stressed,
I told every single friend that I would play there, and they were all there.
Soon I was there, in front of the crowd... and the stress took over on me.
Do you remember how I disliked to play in concerts for the music school? I
had exactly the same feeling. I was shaking, sweating, I didn't enjoyed my
gig at all, and that's the kind of thing you sense when you're listening to a
DJ.
After that night, I was so disgusted by mixing house that I really
thought I should stop. I was going to sell my records on eBay when another
friend came to me and told me that a girl he knew was looking for a DJ for
her school's graduation party. I wasn't excited at all, and I was expecting
to get bored. So I asked if I could mix there with two friends of mine,
Greff (aka the friend I was training three times a week with) and Karl.
The party was surprisingly good. As I wasn't expecting anything good, it
could only have been better. And it was the case. The people on the dancefloor
were really excited, and once again Karl amazed me. We then decided to launch
a DJ team so we could spin again together in similar parties.
NR DJ Team
During one year and an half, Karl and I spinned in the biggest school's parties,
in the most famous venues and brussels. I can't say every party was a success, but
we got to know our DJ job better each time.
I must say I had the chance to spin in a lot of events there. For sure, it was
not trance, but rather commercial house, but it gave me the opportunity to be on
the other side of the scene, to get to know the audience, reading through its
reactions and to anticipate. We really enjoyed those parties!
Le Gazon
A few months later, in july 2005, I was going out with some friends of mine
after a few beers, and we went to Le Gazon. Le Gazon is an open-air free-entrance
event organised every year in Brussels during summer, every not-raining friday and
saturday evening. It features all styles of electronic music, with cheap beverages,
a huge soundsystem and people from every culture and social sphere in there.
I fell in love with it, it was such a cool thing. I immediately tried to find
someone from the organisation, who gave me an email address. I wrote a mail when
I was back home, with a link to a demo, and they said that Trance was never played
at le Gazon but that they would like to give it a try, and that I was booked for
two weeks later, together with a guy from the Prodigy band... yeah those Prodigy's
that made "Firestarter"!
I was spinning just after Leeroy Thornhill, and I must say that I was much more
confident than the first time I had to spin in front of people. Leeroy finished his
set on "Smack my bitch up" or something like that, anyway it was one of these big
Prodigy classics, and the crowd was mad on it. The event-organisers even told me
they never seen crowd-surfing in these events before! Playing after leeroy was
a challenge. I launched my first track and suddenly the people on the dancefloor
started to look at each others. In the first break, i lift my arms up... and it
happened, they followed. The next 55 minutes were the most exciting gig of my
trance experience so far, maybe even from all my DJ life! I was in osmose with
the crowd, I saw a lot of smiling girls and guys showing me their thumb up while
dancing, and I still have goosebumps when I think of it. I saw some "bad" fingers
as well from non-smiling people, but these even typically have so much different
people that you can't satisfy everyone.
After half an hour of uplifting trance, I spinned some techtrance and again,
it worked like a charm. The soundsystem was really phatt, particularily that night
(because of Leeroy), and the guys from FullWave which were doing the Sound&Light
that night really liked my performance, so they were putting the volume up all the
time and doing a great job on the lighting. That's so far one of my best experiences
ever!
Paradise troopers
A few months before, I met Bram Nevejans aka Blue Signal on electrobel.be's boards.
He was producing a track together with another guy called Levin Boon. He asked me for
a review, and I had so many tips and ideas that I asked to make another mix out of it.
When they listened to the mix I made, they really loved it and they proposed me to join
their little project.
Paradise troopers' aim is first of all to produce uplifting euphoric trance,
that kind of trance music that give you goosebumps and make you feel like bouncing
all around the place. We worked a lot on Soulstealers, that first track we made.
We were hoping to get a record deal out of it but the echoes we received were
a bit not enough enthusiastic about it to our taste.
We had a few studio sessions for this project but nothing worth publishing came
out of it. However, Bram's producing skills, Levin's melodies and my own experience
can make something really good, and we still believe it's a project worth working
for, so expect me to work quite some time on it in 2007.
Broadcast on FM
A friend introduced me to Fun Radio, where I was allowed to play one hour of
my style, whatever it was, providing it was something like dance, house, techno,
hardhouse... I then played one hour of Trance, live behind
the turntables, including Paradise Troopers - Soulstealers at the end of the set!
It was so nice to hear my own track on the radio, I was really proud of it.
Later on, I heard that Ben from NRJ Extravadance, one of the biggest saturday
evening radio shows on one of the biggest french-speaking radios was looking for
a trance DJ. As I had nothing to loose, I applied and sent a demo set. After a
few weeks, I learned that some Trance allstars like M.I.K.E. applied and I assumed
I had lost the "contest".
In december 2005, I received a mail from Ben asking me if I was still interested!
M.I.K.E. was away due to a world tour, and he hadn't had the time to make his
mix for the month... and Ben asked me to do a set in place of M.I.K.E.! I, little
bedroom DJ playing here and there, was going to play on NRJ airwaves!
After a few replacements, Ben proposed me to do it every month, as I took the
slot of a DJ who was leaving over. Since then, I am a monthly Extravadance resident
DJ! Ben asked me to give a name to my trance mixes, and I proposed Trance Mutation
Broadcast.
NRJ also gave me the opportunity to spin on their truck during the City parade,
a really big event with trucks playing music parading through the streets of a big
belgian city (usually, they pick another city every year, that one was in Charleroi).
Trance Mutation Broadcast
Around march 2006, Bram told me he received a mail from a radio-DJ who liked
our work. I sent him another mail to thank him, and after some mails he proposed
me to do a mix every two weeks on Radio Saffier, a local radio station broadcasting
on FM in Antwerpen (2d biggest city of Belgium, near to holland and the sea), and
on the North-Brabant of Holland. I accepted, and then he asked me to introduce
myself a little bit in the beginning of each set. From episode to episode, I was
speaking more fluently (speaking on the radio in a language which isn't your mother
language and that you only practiced at school isn't easy at all), introducing the
tracks.
Later on, Rob had to put his radio show on hold for some time as he had some
personal matters to sort out first. So, TMB was put on hold for some time as well,
still airing on NRJ every month, but the bi-weekly radio-show was off-air!
Fortunately, Patrick, the radio station director
sent me a mail a few weeks later, proposing me to take care of the friday evening,
because I was "the perfect person with the right music mix" to do that
job. You may imagine how pleased I was to read this! We agreed to start the show
on the 15th of september, so I had time to organize myself.
Since then, every week, I'm spending an evening preparing a trance set. I
host guest DJ's every other week in theory, but I sometimes hadn't the time to
prospect or the deadlines were to tight to ask for a guestmix, so I mixed quite
a lot in place of my guests. Now the planning is getting a little bit more organized,
but I suggest you head to the "Radio Shows" section if you want to find out
more about that.
Youniversity
In march 2006, together with Karl, we decided to stop the "NR DJ Team". Some
of the guys who were acting as our "agents" (or at least, they wished to) were
so much of morons that we had enough of school parties. It wasn't without an
idea in our minds, because a good friend of us who already booked us for a few
parties was launching a weekly party concept in one of the biggest nightclubs
of Brussels-City.
Every thrusday, the You'niversity parties are held at Le You nightclub, and
Karl and I were asked to be residents... and of course we really wanted to!
Since then, every other thursday, i'm mixing there. I learned quite a lot of
stuff regarding house, but that's still too fresh to synthetise it here. I can
only say that I think that these events made me more aware of the importance of
a DJ set buildup. I don't mix together with Karl anymore, but we use to attend
each other's gigs.
Business plan
I have a bunch of project regarding music, but you'll be kept informed in
time. My aim is obviously to get a record-deal, being signed on a label, together
with Paradise Troopers. I am thinking of preparing a live set soon as well.
