Radley Marx

Doggie Handbag Mix

This is a warm-up session mix I did for the It’s (for) the Dogs Knees benefit last Saturday. It was recorded on the fly on the day before the party, so it’s almost everything I played with just a couple of exceptions.

For those who may not know, handbag is a common term used by DJs (etc) that refers to a type of popular dance music produced in such a way that women are inclined to go out in groups on the dancefloor and dance around their purses.

In this case, a lot of the tracks are electro and trance released over the past few years. It’s a little enthusiastic – I went nuts with the filters because I was having so much fun and even tossed in a couple of super cheesy bits. Artists include Ils, 30Hz, Midfield General, Kidda, Underworld, Fatboy Slim, and Book of Love.

Here’s the mix: Doggie Handbag Mix (1:30, 207MB, 320k)

It’s (for) the Dog’s Knees

Over the weekend I played my first “live” DJ gig in over 5 years for a benefit for a friend of a friend’s dog. Dino needs expensive knee surgery, so like most folks in SF they held a party and asked everyone to donate. The Stargaze crew provided sound, beats, and lasers for the night and we all had a lot of fun playing on a real sound system in a warehouse.

One main highlight for the night was playing with Kevin’s full-spectrum laser. It’s been a while since I’ve been to a rave — when I left blue lasers were just making an entrance. I’d seen his laser once before, but that was a few years ago and I didn’t really get to see it as well as last Saturday. I couldn’t shoot video from my iPhone, so I took some stills and made a fun gif animation.

Why I use a cracked copy of Traktor

I’ve got a gig this next weekend. Nothing big, but I do have to play in front of a crowd. As part of that gig I expect to play digital tracks via TRAKTOR. But this afternoon, I was surprised to find I couldn’t actually run TRAKTOR.

The application (that I paid for) would only open as a demo. If I tried to reactivate TRAKTOR I was directed to the Native Instruments ServiceCenter software, which attempted to connect to their server to confirm my license and couldn’t. Not knowing what was going on I went to native-instruments.com and saw this message: 

Server Downtime

Dear Visitor,

Due to technical problems, our site is temporarily not available. We appreciate your patience and apologise for any inconvenience this may cause. Please try again in 30 minutes.

Your Native Instruments Online Team

 

Since the NI website is down, I can’t connect to confirm and actually use my software.

Two things struck me at this moment (i.e. 5pm PST). First, anyone who relied on the legitimate version of TRAKTOR for a live gig right now (i.e. it’s 1am in Europe) was just screwed. Second, I personally had a crack of TRAKTOR left over, so I’m in the clear and can journey on.

Why exactly do I have a crack? Because when I purchased TRAKTOR I experienced a very similar problem: ServiceCenter wouldn’t let me create a user account, without which I couldn’t get whatever prerequisites. It was a Saturday and I had just paid $500 for this software and wasn’t allowed to play with it for more that 30 minutes at a time, until this problem could be resolved.

To add insult, Native Instruments only provides live support Monday through Friday 9-5pm (PST). That means no night and weekend support (which ironically is when most people are using their product). I’d have to wait until Monday morning until I could actually use my software and try again that night. But if there were any more problems, wait again until the next morning etc.

So now I use a cracked copy of TRAKTOR.

My advise – get the crack. It’s available everywhere, is more reliable, and isn’t handicapped by bad DRM.

 

[Update 6pm] looks like the website is back up. But TRAKTOR still needs to be reactivated and ServiceCenter wants my Serial Number before I can play. For me, I just have to dig into the closet to find my TRAKTOR box that has the card. But for those of you trying to perform right now, I recommend a couple of kamakazis to kill the pain. Hopefully you’ll still get paid.

Crate Classics – Mix Set

A few weeks back I played a 6+ hour set featuring a lot of tracks that, while once popular, had been set aside to mature. The set was a lot of fun but alas, half of the recording was lost due to a technical glitch.

I had so much fun pulling out those records, I went back last weekend to redo the missing stuff. Naturally, I couldn’t stick to the script and ended up playing something that could only be described as classic tracks made up of refined bin diving in a collection spanning over 25 years (or so).

This new 50-track, all vinyl mix is just over four hours long and features dubby chill tracks, buzzy techno and breaks, pop trance, disco house, a few 80s synth hits, and a few surprises.

Tracklisting is in the ID3 tags (lyrics).

Aphex Twin – motivational poster