dozens and dozens served. the dj's shadow.

The first person to read this post will be my 1000th visitor!

Watch this! It's a high school percussion band playing two tracks from "Endtroducing". Then read a little bit about it here.

This clip made me think a couple things. Like momus said, DJing has gotten pretty lame. I think the last couple generations of software have made it kind of easy, and reduced DJing back down to a dubious technical skill, the way it had been before hip hop. The beat matching is done for you, and everyone's releasing a cappella tracks... it's just a hobby now, and some people want to get paid for it.
DJ shadow (sacramento's proudest son), is the man to thank and blame for the whole dj boom of the last 10 years, but man... he was doing it on another level. I saw his live show in san francisco back when (see "Losing my edge"), and became a big old shadow fan. He was spinning four turn tables!... and he was making the best music of the decade. I think spin magazine were the first people I read to call him the Hendrix of the turntable. Today's dj's are a far cry from that. There's a very special place in my heart for Erlend Oye's DJ Kicks album, but there ain't no one doing what Shadow was doing.

Second, the musically trend of the new millenium = taking non-instrumental recordings, like Shadow or NES soundtracks and playing them live. It's a cool thing right now, and a nice way to shift a paradigm, but what about "creating" music? Between the mashups, cover versions, and these "analog-ies" good, creative music is being crowded out.
(Recommended "analog-ies" = the old demo tracks from the advantage, "Straight outta compton" by Nina Gordon and Seu Jorge's stuff on the "Life Aquatic" soundtrack.)