This tag team set was three weeks in the making. Before you get too excited – that doesn’t mean we spent three weeks practicing, rather it got posponed for three weeks before we managed to wing it at the last minute. Regardless of how hard I try to keep from growing up it seems inevitable and with that comes substantially less time devoted to mixing records.

After waiting three weeks for the set it took another week (due to a bad cold) to get the podcast posted. My sincere appologies to Andrew who has waited patiently after I promised him to have it up last Monday!

Sorry about the delay in posting this week’s podcast. There was a glitch with the podcast server but it’s fixed so this week’s show is ready for download.

This week Caddyshack and I were going to play a Nukleuz Records tag team set but we’ve postponed that until next week (Sep 14). In it’s place this week’s set is filled with tracks off the brilliant intelligent hard trance label WellWicked as well as the complex layered trance of Noom Records.

I tried to write down the playlist as I went but be warned there could still be a few tracks out of order.

Natious – Lift (Bluestone Records)
Nuw Idol – Polly’s Pharmacy – Dr Bob X-SDose Remix (WellWicked Records)
Nuw Idol – Not Afraid (WellWicked Records)
Natious – Another World (Bluestone Records)
Nuw Idol – Kick Drum Domination (WellWicked Records)
Sonik Kross – Walking with Dreamz (WellWicked Records)
Nuw Idol & Gianni – The Gates of Time – Nuw Idol UK DK Mix (WellWicked Records)

Les Logos – 1.17 – Original Mix (Noom Records)
Instinct – Zero (Noom Records)
Nuw Idol – Out of Id (WellWicked Records)
Natious – Thrust 1
Nuw Idol – Dreamweaver (WellWicked Records)
solarize – DJ Idge (WellWicked Records)
Snack vs. Uwe Hacker – Dampframme – Street Mix (Noom Records)
Waterhouse – Is It Right (Noom Records)
Nuw Idol – The Gates of Time (WellWicked Records)

Our longest show in awhile – Caddyshack starts off the night until Smiley Mike shows up around 11:30. After a half hour set we extend the show for an extra 2hrs playing a non-stop 2 records each tag-team trance set that pushes trance in every possible direction.

Well this week’s show was a bit of a juggling act to get off the ground. CiTR has come a long way in updating the equipment in the on-air studio over the past few years – but I encountered some technical problems early in the show that resulted in a minute or two of dead air part-way into my set. The culprit? Almost broken – then completely broken RCA cables. But the show must go on – and it does. Technical issues finally get fixed by the 32 min mark.

Anyways, I haven’t given it my second listen yet but I know there’s at least a few good mixes and at least a few wobbles. If you read my last podcast post regarding phrasing – there’s at least one really well phrased mix in this set. I’ll post the time code when I get around to listening to it.

I think I’ll have trouble posting the exact playlist in order because I did go back and forth a fair bit, but I’ll post some of the tracks in this mix a little later. There’s quite a few classic trance anthems from years back that have been remixed and added into this week’s mix.

Oh, and the show got started about 20 minutes early, so it’s a bit of an extended set this week.

Here is the partial track listing from this week’s set. Not in perfect order!

Dumonde – God Music (Euphonic Gate Mix)
Dimorphoc – Haunted Strings
Paul Oakenfold – Faster Kill (Roman Hunter Mix)
Outdare! – Live Today (Parks & Wilson’s Annese Dub)
Morris v Rogers – Girl From the Green Dimension (Dub Mix)
Eve 37 – Markus Schulz – You Won’t See Me Cry (Mara Remix)
Union Jack – Yeti
Tomcraft – Lonliness (Club Mix)

Second half of the show – Not in perfect order:

Chac feat. Chilli Gold – 7 Years (Grinder Vox for the Box Remix)
Opus 808 – Don’t Turn Away (e.f.o. Remix)
Transa – Enervate
Paul van Dyk – We Are Alive (Breathless Mix)
Smudge & Smith – Near Me (Mark Shimmon Remix)
Koglin & Dewar – Pushed On (Stephen J Kroos Remix)
Transa – Supernova
Three Drives – Greece 2000 (Leama & James Davis Mix)
Max Graham – Falling Together

I even put a little thought towards which records I should bring for this weeks set – but I think the first hour got off to a bit of a shakey start. I’m not sure, because I haven’t given it my usual Monday morning second listen yet, but I’m pretty sure the second hour was mixed a little better than the first hour. Some nights the mixes really pull together and other nights I just can’t hold the mix right to the bitter end – and believe me, more often than not I push the mix as long as it can go. Not always in my best interest, but short mix DJs never really earned my respect the same way a long mix does. 

I’m working on building a solid base of records to work with right now, so you’ll probably hear some of these tracks again. I’m trying to work in a couple Platipus Records and a Couple Eve Records – which often have such distinctive sounds that it’s hard to mix them seamlessly with tracks from other record labels. 

Sure enough – I’ve only listened to part of the first hour but I’m not very thrilled about it. Right from the get-go I started with a bad mix and that just set the tone for the first hour. It’s too bad because the first mix was going quite well for 3-4 minutes. But all it takes for a great 4 minute mix to go bad is the last 15 seconds. Growing up as a kid I used to hear ‘Close only counts in horseshoes and hand-grenades’ and sure enough – it’s easy to get close. 

I’m also not very happy with the phrasing of the first set. I’ll maybe post something more in-depth another time – but basically (and I’m not even sure if phrasing is the right term) after you get good at matching beats and have it figured out that you have to line up the down-beats – you extend that whole concept to ‘phrases’ of a song. It’s like lining up the first beat of a 32 or 64 note segment on both records. If you can do that then magic can happen!

Here’s an example of what proper phrasing sounds like. Download this week’s podcast and listen to the mix between 1:35:23 and 1:37:35. Once you can phrase your mixes like this it’s practice, practice, practice until you can do it every time. (Easier said than done!)