A few surprising facts about Paul Oakenfold

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I'm still reeling from that epic set by the legend Paul Oakenfold last night at Bluesfest. I will write a review sometime soon but meanwhile enjoy some of these surprising facts about Oakenfold from his wiki page:

  • He's 48. Okay that one is not that surprising but it's interesting nonetheless.
  • Paul once interviewed Bob Marley claiming to be an NME/Melody Maker journalist when he was 21 years old.
  • He used to work as an A&R man for Champion Records when he lived in West Harlem and managed to sign DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince and Salt-n-Pepa. 
  • He was a promoter and British agent for the Beastie Boys and Run-D.M.C.
  • His 'Perfecto Remix' of U2's "Even Better Than the Real Thing" charted higher than the original song. Oakenfold ended up opening for U2 in their Zooropa/Zoomerang tour in over 50 locations.
  • In 1995 he was the first DJ to play on the main stage at the Glastonbury Festival for 90,000 people.  

This guy kinda blows my mind. Full respect.

 

Markus Schulz gives us a glimpse at how important the DJ Mag Top 100 Poll is for DJs

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Markus Schulz provided a fantastic recap of his recent shows in NYC, South America, and EDC in his latest blog post on Facebook. But what was equally as fascinating is to read the perspective of a superstar DJ on his thoughts behind the importance of the DJ Mag Poll:

For the DJs themselves, it is an unbelievably stressful time of the year, especially because it is coupled in with the busiest stretch of gigs due to Ibiza and the summer festivals. Booking agencies and promoters will continually go back and forth for every major festival or arena event all year long, fighting for which DJ gets to play the main stage, who gets the best timeslots or who gets billed above whom; and they primarily use the results of the DJ Mag poll each year as leverage.

So maybe it might be a good idea to reflect on your vote this year because a lot of these DJs depend on it.

(Source: Markus Schulz FB Page)

'Gloving' fighting for legitimacy

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Learned so much about the world of light gloves after reading this LA weekly article. Never knew that there were actual competitions and sponsored light glove teams, fascinating.

"Our goal," Lim adds, "is to show the world that gloving has evolved from this rave thing into a respectable art form."

That quote is from Brian Lim, owner of Emazing Lights. I agree with his sentiment as I also believe the whole light glove phenomena has found a place in the EDM scene without having it be associated with the drug culture.

(Via Emazing Lights)