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We-are-Hiring-SignDo you have an opinion about music? Now’s your chance to vent. Whether you have news, reviews or just a point of view, With the DJ wants to hear from you. Long article or sound-bite, one-off piece or book serialisation, if you’re interested, we’re interested. We can bring your words to the world and that’s not to be taken lightly (or literally).

We will even edit your grammar so don’t be scared – get in touch via email, Twitter or Facebook and let’s have a chat. GET INVOLVED!

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Disco Revival Revival and Lauryn Hill goes to Jail

vice-logoSo it seems we’re not the only ones predicting disco revival revivial this year, Vice think so too. In a very well-considered article (see link below) they lay out the case that in times of social and economic depression we need escapism and- I can’t help but agree- dubstep just doesn’t cut it. We need glamour. So in the 70’s we had the 3-day week and glam rock as antidote (god help us) and now, after narrowly avoiding that ole’ triple dip, we are now looking at that most glamorous and escapist of musical styles to see us through. Vice also suggest that we haven’t really heard disco until we have heard it turned up loud in a club environment and I for one am looking forward to that, should it materialise. It makes sense. All the early clubs we talk about these days, The Sanctuary, The Paradise Garage, The Warehouse, they all had stonking sound systems and the sounds they originally pumped out was, for want of a better word, disco. Viva La Revivial Revival!

Read more: Vice.com

Ever been in one of those bar/pub things where there is a DJ and he/she is playing rubbish/inappropriate music and it’s pretty much just you and your mates in there? As a DJ I can tell you how well requests like “Have you got anything less like this?” go down but now there may be an answer to this that is much better than just doing shots and singing loudly. It’s called CheckinDJ and it allows you to request music using your presence in social media to weight your request. Rather than let you choose specific tunes it offers a range of genres and once you check in by waving any device you register thaLaurynHillt has an NFC tag (you can use your Oyster card, for example) in front of a little doohicky in the bar, you select the genre you want to hear from the app on your phone and- here’s the clever bit- depending on how many mates you have checked-in with you and how many social media apps you register, you have a louder voice. So if it’s a big night out you can rule the roost! (Presumably everybody else will just leave.)

Read more: gizmag.com

Finally, only someone with such a history of misplaced shoulder chips like Lauryn Hill would play the slavery card when in court for tax evasion. She told the judge on Monday “I am a child of former slaves who had a system imposed on them.” Didn’t we all Lauryn, didn’t we all? While we probably agree with your assessment of pop culture’s “climate of hostility, false entitlement, manipulation, racial prejudice, sexism and ageism.” we do not see how that would stop you paying your tax. Now- go to prison and pay your fine, one time.

Read, and possibly guffaw: bigstory.ap.org

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Eurovision

eurovision2013_malmo_bidIt’s Eurovision this Saturday you’ll be excited to hear. It’ll be awful of course, at least musically. If we’re lucky we might get one or two barely passable pop tunes and a couple of oddities to laugh at. The rest will be utterly risible. But like a lot of people who should know better I will still watch it. I’m not really sure why? Perhaps it’s because it’s tradition or an excuse to moan about how horrible the rest of Europe is when they never give us any points in the blatantly political scoring or even just a good chance to laugh at some funny foreigners. In any case I’ll be tuning in with a decent supply of alcohol on hand to see me through the pain.

This year we’ve continued the recent trend of getting an artist who was once pretty popular but frankly has seen better days with the dubious honour going to Bonnie Tyler in 2013. She may have sung at least two of the greatest soft rock songs ever but seems she’s been saddled with a really generic piece of pop-ballad rubbish. Assuming it would be awful I hadn’t bothered to listen to it before sitting down to write this, I rather wish I hadn’t now. Still if you’re feeling masochistic have a listen too:

The big question for me is if Ireland will trot Jedward out for the third year in a row or not? They seem determined to never win again after a costly series of wins a few years back and surely Jedward can ensure that. I kind of hope they do. it’s always fun to watch a pair of mentally challenged freaks jump around. On which subject I wonder what the Germans will do? I like it when they try to be zany, nothing better than Germans trying to be funny.

Anyway if this has got you in the mood for some slightly xenophobic, dubiously musical ‘fun’ it’ll be on BBC1 on Saturday at 8pm with Graham Norton commentating. I haven’t actually checked that so I could be wrong. But I doubt it – it’s Eurovision, it never changes.

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Sniffer dogs, Mrs Mau5 sings and Slayer news.

sniffer_dogWhilst WTDJ had no personal issue with the sniffer dog accosting every single member of the queue to get into Sunday’s Enter event at Brixton’s O2 Academy, clearly some people did. At least this is what I assume was the reason for the huge crowd of anxious and eager people opposite the entrance watching said dog’s every move, rather than joining the queue to get in. We have been to the Academy many, many times for all sorts of gigs ranging from Hawkwind to Lamb to the Chemical Brothers and although we have seen it less full, we have not seen it less full recently. There was room to move about, to dance, even. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say it was because a certain number of ticket-holders chose to flog their tickets to the ever-present touts outside rather than risk being fingered by the dog or to go to an all night event without drugs. Assuming Brixton’s no re-entry policy will be relaxed for the Playground Festival next month, it will be interesting to see if the dog remains throughout the weekend, and if attendance is affected.

kat_von_dee

If WTDJ was sceptical about the motives behind the Mau5’s wedding a few weeks back, nothing could have prepared us for this. Yes, the man we most love to hate has produced Mrs Mau5 singing. Oh dear, love is apparently deaf, as well as blind. Truth be told though, it’s not bad. The production is very nicely minimal and in these auto-tune days, you just need to go “Argh!” into a sampler to sing a song, don’t you?

Listen if you dare: Soundcloud

Finally, good news for Slayer fans. According to his Facebook page, Jeff Hannemann’s death was in fact alcohol-related. Better than necrotizing fasciitis from a spider bite, isn’t it? Much more Rock’n’Roll.

Read More: BBC

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The sad, slow death of London clubland

London_ClubAs you may well have heard London club Cable was closed down last week, having lost a lengthy legal battle with Network Rail who own the arches the venue was situated in. It’s a real shame as it was a great club and more importantly one of the last few decent mid-sized venues in the capital. Cable is the latest in a long line of venues that have closed and slowly torn the heart of the London dance music scene.

I admit that personally I only went to Cable a handful of times in the last few years, I’m too old for regular clubbing these days and I can’t handle it too often. But it was lovely little venue that was a big enough to have a decent sized crowd but not so big as to lose the charm and intimacy you get in small clubs. It also had an excellent sound system, good staff and most importantly had great lineups – a mix of genres from week to week and decent headliners at each one. The sort of events you used to get a dozen of every Friday and Saturday in the city ten years ago but now it’s the exception – there’s just no where to host them! I almost forget the full list but casualties have included a trio of classic venues in King’s Cross; the iconic End; Turnmills in Farringdon; a host of venues around London Bridge (with Cable the last to go); Herbal and several other decent small clubs around Shoreditch and on and on. As with Cable in nine out of ten of the cases they’ve shut down as property developers have moved in with their eyes on the property’s value and nothing else.

Cable1Obviously London isn’t totally devoid of clubs but the range is now much more limited both in number and style. We have two world class superclubs with Fabric and Ministry of Sound, but how much they appeal to you depends on you ability to tolerate tourists, students and those with a more casual interest in the music not to mention ability to afford the entrance fee and bar prices. Whatever your personal views though you can’t deny both have amazing lineups and regularly appear in list of top clubs in the world.

Yet after those two big hitters the list of proper full time clubs becomes very short – XOYO and Village Underground in Shoreditch; a couple in Brixton; the mostly awful Egg near King’s Cross; Corsica Studios and a few other places in the Elephant & Castle orbit of MoS; a handful of venues that have as many live acts as DJs like Heaven or the Rhythm Factory and the odd smaller venue dotted around like The Nest in Dalston. It might sound like a lot but for one of the biggest cities in the world that is meant to be a global cultural centre it’s pretty poor. The list has got so short that a number of previously gay clubs such as Fire in Vauxhall have been putting on more and more mainstream nights as they’ve seen the huge gap in the market.

This lack of available places to host events has meant that promoters have been increasingly turning to other solutions. A favourite, especially for events aimed at the more youthful crowd, are warehouse parties. Such spaces often provide the area to hold the thousands of clubbers needed to host very impressive lineups but just as often come with pretty basic facilities, rubbish sound, pricey tickets and the risk that the council won’t grant the licence at the last minute leaving the clubber out of pocket and a weekend ruined.

To avoid such risks other promoters, especially those with a brand they don’t want to tarnish, have been using more traditional rock venues such as Koko or Brixton Academy. It makes sense – there’s no good new rock bands so they may as well take their space. Yet it often doesn’t work that well. The venues are designed for one big crowd to stand and watch a band for an hour without moving around. Clubs however last for much longer and have a crowd that is constantly in flux and moving around so you end up spending most of the night in queues to get from one place to another.

closedFurther down the promoting scale people have been trying to get nights going in bar venues or Dalston basements. Some work on some occasions but the fact no venue has really made a name for itself shows it’s a pretty hit and miss affair. You’ll note that we’ve not hosted a Glue for over a year, the lack of decent venues has been a major factor in that and we’re not the only promoters either stuck or simply giving up due to having no space, I’ve talked to several over the last year or two in exactly the same position. It’s really having a negative impact in the number and range of good, small club nights in London – the big named DJs just about get away with it with Fabric, MoS, warehouses and rock venues but the less marquee names that should act as a supporting community to those events and nurture new talents and sounds just are’t there. Over the last fifty years London has created or contributed to dozens of new scenes and sounds, most recently world conquering dubstep, but as things stand now I can’t see that happening again soon.

Boris and his ridiculous little administration should know that London’s culture is as important, if not more so, than its economy. He should not only find a way to protect key musical venues from property developers but ensure that new ones can be built in the right areas too. It should be a key electoral pledge for any mayoral candidate that they will protect the city’s culture as much as anything else. To start let’s get three or four new mid-sized clubs (500-750 capacity) built in the next year. That might just stabilise the situation enough to stop total disaster. Of course it isn’t going to happen so perhaps time we all have to think about moving to Berlin, I hear they still know how to do clubbing.

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