John Johr says Detroit is shady as hell. And he would know. The Detroit-based DJ has ten years of spinning records under his belt, and just a little less pushing them at Detroit’s Record Time and promoting parties as a Paxahau resident. This year, he will spin at the ten year anniversary Movement festival in May and release his first record, Baby, as part of a Left’d compilation.  

Yeah, it was really funny. The story of Jonny Nikowski and I is awesome. Like, somehow we made friends. We had a mutual friend – this guy I went to high school with named Al. He was actually a total weirdo. He introduced us and I was like, what, 18? And I had just started DJing. I had just got turntables and I has just got involved in the dance music scene and Jon had been DJing for a while and was kind of slightly established in Detroit. It was ten years ago, so I was 18 and Jon was doing these house parties in his basement, these really cool house parties and he had a lot of really awesome DJs down there. Guys like Mike Huckaby, Traxx from Chicago. And there were a crew of us. And I basically learned to DJ in his basement.

More after the jump.

Me, Jon and four other guys hanging out playing records.

Ten years ago. Like almost ten years on the dot. Like ten and a half years, actually. Rolling in on the ten and a half year mark. So I learned how to DJ in his basement.

Now he’s bringing you down to play a party? You came down to Austin for the first time in 2008?

Yeah, it was two years ago.

You came here to play Plush?

Yeah. I played Plush, which was awesome. Tiny venue. Huge sound system. Packed.

That was U Make me Funktion 1.

Yeah, the first UFunktion party. And then we did a boat party on Saturday, which was interesting to say the least, but the Plush party was really the highlight, I think, of that. Kinda getting down here and seeing Austin for the first time.

What do you think of the city?

I love Austin. I can’t stop talking about it, really. Austin itself, the city is amazing, and being down here for events like SXSW. The first time I came down here was Austin City Limits.

ACL.

Yeah. And to see how the city comes alive, people in rock, hip hop, whatever, all kind of converging on this city, which is a really nice city to begin with, all these people kind of converge on this city, and the venues and the promoters they kind of all kind of work together to make it go off- it’s really cool to see that because I don’t see a lot of that where I come from.

Cooperation? Yeah, I’ve heard mixed reviews of Detroit as a city, and as a scene, though there are badass DJs and producers coming from there right now.

Well, Detroit has a scene. That’s the thing about Detroit. The history of Detroit is very unique. Culturally it’s very unique. But the music scene is divied up. It’s segregated, not so much by race, but by clique. And that was kind of the whole reason I found any success in Detroit, was the fact that I kinda broke those walls down and don’t believe in labeling people, whether they’re like “club kids,” or like “trashy douchebags,” or into progressive or trance. I don’t label people like that. I’m all about good music that makes people dance, and I don’t care what style of music it is, or the medium in which it’s presented, it’s just music itself, and it being played in a manner which gets people to dance. At the end of the day it doesn’t matter what it is. It’s geting the party to pop off, and that’s very important to me, and that’s all I care about.

UFunktion v.06

Yeah. Yesterday I played at Stubbs BBQ.

How was it?

It was awesome. It was really cool. I didn’t actually realize that Stubbs was such a famous venue. Jon (U Funktion) pointed it out to me the first time that I came down here, but I didn’t really know that that venue was so famous and that it had hosted like all the top musicians in the world. And I got the opportunity to play there via Spin Magazine and Movement. It’s just one of those things I’ll never forget. I’m really honored to be a part of an event like that and showcase the style of music I play in front of a rock crowd.

Like an indie rock crowd? Oh, Hole! Did you see Hole?

Yeah, Courtney Love got the band back together, man. Courtney Love performed with Hole for the first time in ten years, and I shared the stage with her. She put on a really good show. It’s the closest link that I’ll ever get to Nirvana or Kurt Cobain. I was a huge fan of Nirvana and Kurt Cobain growing up.

Who else have you seen?

It’s kind of been a whirlwind due to the nature of how everything unraveled.

I came in on Thursday morning and I leave on Monday afternoon. We’ve kind of, by chance, seen some stuff, but nothing was premeditated. Like the hotel that a couple of friends were staying at, they had like this live blues guy, and I can’t remember his name right now, but he was like, live on the radio, and we were hanging out in the lobby of the hotel watching this guy play blues. It was awesome. So this whole experience, SXSW, you just stumble into awesome music and you don’t really realize it cause the whole city’s on fire.

It’s amazing for this time of year.

So you’ve been with Paxahau for 4 years? Or is your bio old?

You saw my old bio. It actually just got updated before I came down here. I’ve been with Paxahau for five years. I started with them in April of 2005. At the time I was working at Record Time, which if you’re into dance music, then you’ve probably heard of. It’s the first store in Detroit that really had dance music as the showcase, and Mike Huckaby was one of the guys who really made it unravel. I got to work there with him in 2005, and at the same time I got involved with Paxahau. So it started off with me doing production – setting up, tear down, and promotion, me handing out flyers. I did a couple of parties. I mean I was a “resident DJ,” but I was a worker. I was helping these parties go off, and the parties were awesome. The first party I did with them was Autechre, and Autechre was a very experimental group, but very unique to have them be my first party with a mostly techno and house event production company. We were doing anywhere from 25 to 30 events a year. It was one of those things where I didn’t really realize what I’d gotten myself into.

But you’re still with them.

I’m still with them. My involvement’s kinda stripped back now. I’m focusing more on being an artist at this point in my life. I do audio archiving as well, so if you go on paxahau.com and you go into the archive section, from 2006 until 2009 all of the sets that are in the archives, I was the one that chopped them up and mastered them. I was recording everything at the parties and engineering [the recordings] and getting them online. Now I want to be an artist. I’m a dj. I’m writing music. I got my first record coming out at the end of the month.

Tell me about that.

I have one track coming out on a various artists compilation with Left’d. It’s a sublabel, the digital sublabel of Leftroom, out of the UK. It’s Matt Tolfrey’s label, and it’s a pleasure to be able to put out a record with a really, really awesome label. Not only do I play all their tracks, but I have one coming out with them. It’s like, ‘this is amazing.’

I’m on a various artists compilation. It’s four tracks total. Unfortunately, I’ve read the press a thousand times, but I don’t remember anything regarding the other artists. Greg Paulus is doing a track on the compilation, and he’s one half of No Regular Play. And No Regular Play is one of the featured artists on Wolf + Lamb, which is an absolutely amazing label out of New York -one of my favorite labels at the moment. And it’s two other debut tracks from two other of the artists on the compilation as well, so I’m a part of a digital sublabel to an established UK label that their primary focus is young talent, up and coming talent. So it’s really cool. I wil I had a little cheat sheet with me.

Well, the track that’s coming out is actually like the second track I ever wrote. Ever. That I actually finished.

Where is the first one?

The first one was probably like three or four months prior, but that track nothing ever came of. The track’s actually awful.

Your first track wasn’t awesome?

No. The first track I wrote, you know, I never sent that to anybody. But then there was – it was like literally the second track I ever wrote- and I wrote it in Ableton, and it’s a house track. It’s more like a Chicago style house track – kinda loopy, vocal snippets. I’m gonna play it tonight. It’s called Baby. It’s an accident. A beautiful mistake.

Detroit branded.

Cool. So you just sent it to someone, they heard it, and they liked it?

I actually didn’t send that track to anyone either. I wrote it and then I started more tracks and then I probably was like four or five tracks in when I sent a whole group out to a handful of people, and they were like “Dude, you’re really starting to get onto something here. You’re doing good work. keep working.” And then, my buddy, my roommate, Lee Curtiss, actually one of my best friends in the whole world, helped me mix it down properly and he sent it to Matt Tolfrey. So you know, I did the track by mistake in Ableton and they ended up picking it up. I don’t have any intention on trying to get on any certian labels, but I’m just gonna keep on writing music and see what happens. I don’t wanna do anything else but write music. It’s my passion. It’s my life. I’ve dumped girls, quit jobs and dropped out of school for dance music.

So what are you playing on tonight? Turntables and vinyl?

I keep it simple. I’ve got some vinyl with me. I don’t know if I’m gonna play it all tonight, but i’ve got some vinyl. Two turntables, one mixer, Serato and vinyl, and tonight I’m not gonna try to play all the new hits. I’m gonna play tracks that I really enjoy, a handful of my friends’ tracks.

What do you love right now?

Right now, my favorite artists are kinda really my buddies. Guys from Detroit like Lee Curtiss, Seth Troxler, Ryan Crosson, Shaun Reeves. I’ve known all of them for a really long time, but they just so happen to write some of the best dance music, in my opinion, in the world right now. That’s the thing about dance music that I love. Everyday there’s a track that comes out from some kid you’ve never heard of before and the track’s, you know. You get hit upside the head. Really amazing music comes from random people all the time. So I can’t really put my finger on, like, besides a handful of my friends. I mean guys like Matt Tolfrey and Inxec, Wolf + Lamb, No Regular Play, Nicolas Jaar. It’s hard to kinda put your finger on one label or one style because dance music is always evolving and there’s always new people coming around. All you need is a laptop and Ableton and you can write amazing music. Not saying that people will, but it happens.

Yeah? I kinda like how you said that you don’t care about the medium or how it happens, just that people write it and they put it forth.

Yeah, that’s the thing. I don’t care if you put it in CD players, turntables, cassette deck, reel to reel, you got a kazoo and a kick drum, if it sounds great and people dance to it, it’s awesome. You can spare that shit for the whiney old grouches. That’s fine. They can have that idea or ideal. I think it’s self defeating. I think dance music is supposed to be forward thinking music, and who cares what you use to make great music come out of speakers. It’s just that great music comes out of speakers and people get down to it. That’s all I care about. Save all the other bullshit for all the other pain-in-the-assholes. I’m not that guy.

I’ve read interviews, and I’m not gonna name names, but I’ve read interviews from guys that are like “I only play vinyl, and fuck Serato. That shit’s bullshit. It crashes all the time.” Yeah, so technology fails. Technology’s not perfect. Vinyl’s not perfect. You get a scratch in your vinyl and it doesn’t play perfectly. That’s life. Deal with it. That mentality doesn’t work with me. It works with other people, and that’s fine, but it doesn’t work with me.

So tell me about Movement. Why is it called Movement now? This will be my first year.

Well you picked a great year to come. Derrick May originally started calling it Movement. He took the festival over in 2003. The first three years, now this might be a little off, but it was Detroit Electronic Music Festival. DEMF. And that was actually copyrightten. It’s copyrightten and owned by Carol Marvin, the original producer of the festival. Carl Craig was the creative director. Carol Marvin was the one that produced the event. And then obviously there was internal struggles, drama, and it unraveled in a manner in which that dissolved and Derrick May took it over. He couldn’t call it DEMF so he had to coin it as something else, so he called it Movement. So he did the festival for a couple years under the Movement name. Kevin Saunderson did it after Derrick May took it over and he called it Fuse-in. We got the rights to do the event and we bought the name Movement from Derrick May. And that story is an amazing story.

We’ve had it as Movement ever since. We actually tooled around with changing the name but it’s one of those things. How are you gonna change the name of this event? Though there’s movements all over the place, bands and other parties. There’s movement Torino, which we partnered up with.

In Italy. Did you get to go this last year?

I didn’t go. It was really weird how it worked out. I went to Europe for the first time at the end of September and I was there for 25 days until the middle of October.

Where were you?I did my first mini tour, if you will. I went to Berlin, Munich, Zurich, Switzerland, and London, and I did three parties in Berlin. I played at Club der Visionaere the first day I got there. And literally, I got off the plane, I dropped my stuff off at my buddies flat, and we went to der Visionaere, and we hung out there for like 12 hours or something. I played for six, and that was like my introduction to Berlin and the dance music culture there, which is a whole different thing.

I’ve been there for a bit. I didn’t get to go to der Visionaere, but I went to Watergate and Panoramabar.

I played at Watergate. I got to play with Seth Troxler at Watergate, and that was really cool. Downstairs. Amazing scene. The DJ booth is right on the water. That was breathtaking.

Did you fall in love?Absolutely.

I kinda fell in love. I’m not over it yet.

Well, it’s very culturally different there and that’s a hard thing to get over, is German culture is very different than American culture. I mean, it’s Europe. Obviuosly it’s gonna be different, but I didn’t really realize what I was getting myself into.

What stood out to you? What made an impression?

I think that the dance music scene there [in Germany] is amazing. Any night you can walk into a club and there’s 500 people getting down. There’s always something amazing going on, or it seems to be that way, but the actual culture in Berlin seems to be – not necessarily Berlin cause there’s a lot of young hip forward thinking people there- but some of the older people are very cold. It’s a very cold culture. If you can’t speak German at all, there’s people that, they might even know how to speak English but they won’t speak English to you because they’re like very ‘You’re an American in Germany, so you have to make the effort to mesh with our culture.’

So you really felt that while you were there?

I spent probably eight or nine days there. I had to go to Kinko’s and pick up a stack of flyers, and I walked in and was like ‘Sprekenzie English?’ and everyone was like ‘No!’ I’m trying to handle business and there’s no one there that could work with me. I didn’t do the right thing. I should’ve learned more German before I went. I should’ve taken the ten hours it took to get there to read a book about speaking German. It was a dumb move on my part. It was really funny cause I went down to Munich and did two gigs in Munich, and it’s very conservative in Munich. Very, very conservative in Munich. I went down there and it was Oktoberfest. I rolled into Munich during real Oktoberfest and it was Bavarians in lederhosen, and they’re farmers. Its a farming culture, and that’s what the whole thing is -drinking beer and eating Bavarian food and you get all dressed up for it. And then I play my party and there’s dudes and chicks in lederhosen getting down to techno, and it was crazy. That was really cool.

The best part of my trip besides London was Zurich. I played at Alte Börse for City Fox. City Fox is a record label out of Zurich and they put out amazing minimal techno and tech housey type stuff and they did this party. It was Lee Curtiss’ birthday party. It was Seth, Lee, Ryan Crosson, Bill Patrick, Ryan Elliott, Dejun, and I can’t remember the other residents name, and myself. Alte Börse is kinda like the venue we’re in now. It was the old stock exchange that they turned into a club. It was one of the best sound systems I’ve ever played on. At 11 P.M. there were 1,300 people in there. That knocked my socks off. And the funny thing was they side swipped me. I thought I was just gonna play at the after party but at six in the morning the boys were like ‘So, you got your harddrive right?’ and I was like ‘Yeah’ and they were like ‘Well get ready, cause you’re gonna play in an hour.’ I went on at 7 in the morning and i played til 9 and it was a total surprise. It was awesome.

So your first time in Europe you had a badass time. Sounds amazing.It was definitely an amazing experience. I’ll never forget any part of it. I remember everything. And it doesn’t matter really how hard I was partying. I will remember everything on that trip. Everything. We drove from Munich to Zurich on the autobahn.

I didn’t get to check that out.It was so cool. We spent a week in London, and it was just awesome. I was really lucky that I got to do that experience and I got to do it with my best friend as well, my best friend Matt, who goes by – his nickname’s Beaver. He runs a booking agency out of L.A. called Bonus Level Booking. I’m actually on their roster now. It’s a very, very new booking agency. Myself, Bill Patrick, a few other guys are on teh roster. They threw a Leftroom showcase. He’s my best friend in the whole world and he got to do, me did the whole trip together. And that made it that much more special, you know what I mean? So Europe was great.

This is a great year for you. You got to go to Europe. Your first record is coming out. When is that coming out?It’s coming out at the end of the month. I actually don’t have the exact release date, but I believe it’s gonna be coming out maybe right before Miami, I hope. If not, then maybe a little bit after Miami.

So there are good things coming in the future for you.

I hope so. I can’t say for sure that anythings gonna happen but we’re gonna try to go back to Europe in July, and I’m just gonna keep working on tracks and try to put out music and play good music and have fun along the way.

Are you going back to live and hang out or just for another…Just go back there for maybe a three, four week trip. I have no intentions on moving to Europe at this point in my life. If I was to move to Europe I’d move to London, so it’s really not even Europe, it’s the UK. I don’t think I could live in Berlin or anywhere else. I have very strong ties in Detroit and I love living there and I don’t see myself leaving very soon.

I’m glad to hear that it’s a lovable city and not just super shady.

Oh no, it’s shady. It’s scary. Totally. But you’re coming for the best year. I love Detroit. I love Detroit for its poverty and its crime as much as I love it for its music and art culture. We have a very long history of amazing music and art in Detroit. Take it all the way back to Motown, the MC5. If you take it to techno, Derrick May, Kevin Saunderson and Juan Atkins. It’s those guys that kicked it off for us and they’re the reason why I’m here. And they’re here becasue of Motown.

Because of the way music distribution is changing, and how easy it is to get music online for free, what do you think of the future of music distribution and how it’s gonna get out and how are artists will live and music lovers will act?

It’s pretty blatently obvious to me that mp3 is gonna be the main medium. Especially state side.

Does that scare you as someone that’s trying to produce and it’s completely changing?

If you wanna get down to the nuts and bolts of it, to make money as an artist, you’re not gonna make money off your records. It’s not gonna happen like that. You make money off your gigs. Gigs are what’s gonna pay your bills, but it’s not one gig. You’re not gonna cash in and live like a fat cat.You gotta go out there and tour, travel and play shows and establish yourself as an artist. And that’s fine. I like that. It’s all part of the fun to me. I like traveling. I like playing shows. And I get a little money? Sweet. Even if I get no money I still have fun. Like I said before, I don’t care about any bullshit except for having fun and making people dance. I really don’t.

     Ah, the ups and downs or being “underground.” Austin’s techno scene is sometimes so typically off the radar that it seems non-existent. Following the closure of the Burleson Warehouse, the few techno promoters doing anything techno asked for their parties to NOT be publicized, NOT be blogged about, promoted or hyped. In a return to the clandestine party planning of the old days, locations for techno parties in this city are being disclosed just a day before scheduled parties, often to be visited by police anyway.

     But techno is alive, and Austin has the producers here to prove it. Jeff A. Ferguson, known as Jeff Only, will play a live set as Subforce with long-time friend and new production partner Rex Bruton, or Steel Grooves, at Austin’s Official Movement Warm-Up Event during SXSW on March 20th. Describing his style as “funky techno,” Jeff has only been releasing music for a few years on labels like Guilhotina, Glowstam and Valvula, but has more in the works from his solo and collaboration project. In an e-interview he let us in on his longer involvement in techno as a raver, what it’s like to work with his idol Mike Humphries, and what we can expect from Subforce.

Check out a mix, and read the entire interview after the jump.

You’ve only been releasing music for the past two years.  How and when did you get into production?

I started almost four years ago. It’s crazy and don’t laugh, but I honestly was computer-dumb. Completely. Didn’t even know how to turn one on. I just got really tired of feeling scared to do it because R.J. had already gotten pretty far in it and was already doing sound school. Then one day I woke up and said “I’m buying a laptop and I’m learning audio production.” It was a lot of trial and error. A lot of PC troubles as well, so I went full throttle to learning all and just about everything about both at the same time. I went from computer illiterate to building audio machines and providing  tech services to those in need in just about every way possible.  I dedicated all my time to learning. Books, videos, forums -you name it, I was involved. I’ve been a musician most of my life and ideas for sound have always come to me naturally, so once I got the hang of things with the software it was all down hill from there. Granted, I am still very young in all this and have so much to learn. I learn so much everyday . It just blows me away the things I obtain from others around the world doing the same thing.

Read more after the jump.

You’ve talked about your new sound on Soundcloud. How would you describe it and what has led you to that sound?

I worked on those tracks for almost a year, and it took a lot of creative thought to come up with it. I wanted to create something that was on that path of cutting edge along with artist like Advent, Virgil Enzinger without riding their sound, and when techno makes a turn in its sound the way it’s been doing over the past few years it’s hard to do. Real hard. I wanted to make something that would please the community of listeners digging the sound of those without leaving my own. It’s what I’ve come to label as hybrid techno. Simply because it’s just that. Cutting edge sounding but still keeping the influence of tribal elements as well as house, tech-house and so on. Did you know that over in Europe the tribal elements is like…. dead ??? I just dont understand that. But yeah, apparently whats going on with the sound over there isn’t at all like over here.

There are many boundaries in techno today. Everyone has a name for their specific style. (Minimal, tech house, tech trance, progressive, Detroit, schranz, hardgroove.) R.J. and I had a talk one day about how silly this is to us and it is just completely counter productive for everyone. We both got into this music because there was no rules or boundaries. It was all underground music.

How did you and Steel Grooves initially connect? When did you decide to start collabing?

R.J. and I have been best friends for about 16 years. I took R.J. to his first rave party about that long ago. It was an amazing party at the Music Hall with some talent that forever changed the way R.J. and I would involve our lives with music. We immediately purchaced some pawn shop turntables and some vinyl from the 99 cent basket at Alien Records and we were on our way to where we are currently. I always had a way with people as far as promoting for the two of us, so I did just that. A lot of it, and we did well with getting the exposure that we wanted. It was just a matter of time before we would be making music together. The great thing about it all is that we had goals and dreams and now we’re making something of them. Our ears for sound individually has ranged so wide throughout our lives, so our ability to cross barriers is always a new challenge and a lot of fun.

How do you feel about the scene here? Why isn’t techno stronger here?

I think it’s probably because there are not a lot of techno producers and DJs . When I look at the actual artists doing what R.J. and I are doing it’s such a small number. Especially in Texas.There’s just not enough techno promoters pushing techno parties. Promoters are bringing only the artists that will bring them money instead of something thats worth alot more than that. R.J., Jon Eric, Jeremy and I put everything to bringing techno talent to Austin without money being the first thing of importance. We just stay true.

Tell me about upcoming, or most recent, releases.

My release with Valvula has finally hit the digital stores. Its a 138 bpm tribal release that I had alot of fun with in the making. A lot of learning going on there in that point of my production but still quality. Quality is always the most important. R.J. and I aren’t really doing solo work anymore since we’ve decided to go all out with our Subforce collaboration. We have out our release with Disturbulence which dropped a month or so ago and it’s our first official Subforce release, so we’re proud of it. It’s unique. I like to be able say that about our work because we don’t sound like anyone else that’s releasing in the same area of techno that we are. Every new track we work on together has only been getting better, so it’s a good feeling, and it keeps us positive as well as motivated.

We have remixes releasing under our good friend Roman Zawodny’s Mad Hatter HRD label like Andy Kemp, Petrae Foy, Kyfu & Hotwire, CSystem, PJC-Project, Mindform -they’re all really quality remixes and were very happy to be involved with them. We can’t wait till they drop in the stores.

We also have some really cool stuff that’s releasing on another great label ran and owned by some eally good friends of ours, Inter Tech (CrazyTeck & Alen Milivojevic) which is already doing well and with a nice number of quality producers that are going to be releasing with them. It’s got us pretty excited.

Oops I almost forgot about my EP with Mad Hatter HRD coming soon, so stay tuned on that.

Just recently I was hit up by Mike Humphries and I’ve been spending a great deal of time getting to know him. Let me say this guy was a god to people like R.J. and I. We own all his vinyl releases and respect all he’s done in the techno community. For those of you who don’t know, he was the owner of Punish Records, Red Seal, and currently owns Mastertraxx . I just locked down two vinyl releases with him so were without words on that whole thing .

SubForce is doing a live set, so I’ve heard, at an upcoming UFunktion event. What can we expect?

LMFAO!! Well it was news to us when we heard about it, but yeah it’s gonna be pretty cool, I think. We’ll have an Ableton Live set with a couple of APC 40;s and the Korg Electribe drum machine. It’ll be fun. You’re just gonna have to show up and experience the fun with us. I won’t say too much about it, it would ruin the point.

What is the best thing about Austin?

I grew up in Austin, and I am very proud to say that. People that live here carry a very unique state of mind unlike any other city I’ve been to in the States. The city itself is amazing. Lake Travis, 6th street, and of course all the great restaurants here. To keep it short, the best thing about Austin for me is the diversity in the music. There are so may people in Austin that love music and there is something here for everyone.

Individual day passes and four day passes are available at Fla.vor.us.

NightCulture's 2nd EDM Fest

Fans of the deep house dj, producer and host of “Deeper Shades of House” radio show should head out to Lanai’s rooftop lounge on Wednesday, March 17 for his guest appearance at an event hosted by the purveyors of funky, soulful, retro dance music behind Austin’s Hump dance parties.

A Hamburg, Germany to Los Angeles transplant, Behrenroth, established himself as a “deep house addict” over two decades as a DJ and producer, will make a rare stop in Texas for this un-official SXSW event.

More event details are forthcoming. In the meantime, check out some Behrenroth grooves.

Update: Oveous Maximus, who describes his style as “electro-spaceship-caribbean-hip hop-rap wit a dash of R&B” has been added to the line-up. Support will come from Austin-based Paco, Tarek, and live musicians Ilya Janos on percussion and Reverend Pain on saxaphone.

Check out this interview with the Detroit techno dj and producer behind Hej Records here if it doesn’t appear below:

If you missed that R**e, check the track out on C&W’s MySpace, then make sure you snap it up! These guys have plenty where that came from. Their production can already be found online at major outlets, and they have 2010 releases (Cortinas & Wade Remix of Dj Exodus ft. Shannon’s Give Me Tonight) in the works.

C&W at Mega Buzz + space dude

• Being around ppl who aren’t afraid that Ableton will lead to the end of modern civilization
• Hobotech and eating hog eyes
• Francis Preve
• DJ Obah and Akina Adderley & The Vintage Playboys at the Independent

Read more after the jump.

Austin was one of eight U.S. cities to host NYC DJ School Dubspot’s weekends of “interactive workshops, Q&As and live performances” on their Ableton Live 8 Sessions tour. An increasingly ubiquitous program, Ableton Live 8 is production and performance software used by the biggest, best producers around the world, and some of the worst too. Despite the discourse around Ableton and other DJ software that has some of the most creative and forward thinking edm producers pitching fits and sounding like grandparents wishing for the good ol’ days, the session was decently attended by at least 30 students each day.

Sunday’s Ableton Sessions featured some amazing on-the-fly live performances by Dubspot instructors and guests Pilo, Jon Margulies and Francis Preve.  Margulies, a Dubspot instructor and author of Ableton Live 7 & 8, enlightened students regarding Hobo-tech during his session on Advanced Performance Applications. The genre, whose name he coined, goes against NYC’s bottle service sensibility and glorifies low living instead. Margulies even created an example, warping a hobo-esque song to a dance track. Thanks John. I’ll never get those lyrics out of my head. “I got a girl, 6 feet tall, sleeps in the kitchen with her feet in the hall, eatin hog eyes, spittin out chittlins.” Disgusting. Great class though.

Francis Preve also taught a fun class on Creative DJing Options. First of all, he’s really entertaining. His desktop background is a quote about how truly creative types are dirty, unorganized and have strange taste in women. Secondly, perhaps more importantly, he’s a great teacher. Everyone and their mom has taken or wants to take his production classes at ACC, and I can see why.

Saturday night’s CD release event and benefit for NextAid, “Funk Aid” went down at the Independent, a cool venue east of IH-35, between 5th and 6th Street. I arrived just in time for a great performance by Akina Adderley & The Vintage Playboys.  DJ Obah spun a set of funk, jazz and soul next. Obah mixed the FunkAid for Africa CD being released at the event. All proceeds benefit NextAid. Check it out here.

FunkAid CD

Dian Giove, president and founder of Dubspot mentioned loving Austin’s vibe and wanting to start a Dubspot school here. Very interesting. Interested?

Who the hell is Jim Rivers? Besides being the latest selecta behind the Global Undergroud Nu Breed Series, party people in town on Friday November 13, 2009 asked themselves the same question as they paid the $5-15 cover charge and walked into Republic Live to hear him play at a Resurgence and Real Music event. That cover charge started high and went low as the night went on, for the record.

DJ Rivers was a gamble on Friday the 13th. His glitchy, progressive production, released on labels such as Saw, Renaissance and his own Misfit Records imprint were well known and loved by plenty of party people at Republic, and one out of every twenty people from Houston or San Antonio claimed to actually know Rivers personally, but just what would he play? And would anyone show up? The dj circuit in Texas is well worn by the likes of Kaskade and even Keoki, but someone so fresh? Austin heads know that throwing a successful event without some trance or seriously commercial artists involved can be tricky.

Read more after the jump.

Crowd at Jim Rivers

Resurgence attempted a good showing for the event. Honestly, they might not have bothered decorating with black balloons in a venue that is already painted entirely black. How would they have known that the pretty lanterns they hung would pale next to the nearly nude Go Go Gadgettes? This group of nearly ubiquitous go go dancers walked in the door fully dressed in their go go gear and straight over to the dj booth where head Go Go Gadgette Kell!E!’s boyfriend, Andrew Parsons was spinning the big room stuff he thought of as good opening tracks. The Gadgettes immediately turned all heads in the room, and then proceeded to shake it atop gogo boxes with looks on their faces that seemed to say “You don’t have to smile when you look this good.” They were right. The rhinestone studded bra tops layered with another one of frilly blue material, the fishnets, the giant gogo boots and glittery belts around their itty bitty bottoms stole the show for people who weren’t used to seeing them at every edm event in Austin.

UK to Austin transplant Will Konitzer followed Parsons in a steadily progressive vein but glitched and bumped things with his own flavor that quickly built the dance floor, though Republic still seemed empty around midnight. Empty is a relative term. Republic is a club about as large the first level in Sky Lounge/Spin/Cielo if the back room was closed. Still, a few dollars knocked off the cover charge at the door later, Republic filled up.

By the time Rivers went on, he had a full dance floor. His set ramped up nicely as the night went on, and one San Antonio party girl danced over to say that this was “exactly the kind of music I like.” Andrew Parsons took over after Rivers’ set, this time fitting the music to the hour more appropriately, and making everyone dance until the club closed and kicked everyone out. Progressive house is alive and well in Texas. This time, for the crowd and the promoters, the gamble paid off.

Jim Rivers

Friends of Friends

Miguel Douglas and L. Boogie will play Hookah Tech Wednesdays at Redline Hookah. If you haven’t been to this hookah lounge you should. No cover. Hookah specials before 10 p.m.

J.A.M.O.N. will spin at Barcelona for F.I.S.T. No cover.

Keep your ears open for William. The word on the street (read, the Ableton workshop I got to drop in on for a bit this weekend) is that William A has a release due out very soon on Josh Gabriel‘s label, Different Pieces.

Nice one, William!

William A