This way, I’ll be able to post new music often without having to have a storied blog post to accompany it. I enjoy spending an unreasonable amounts of time on things like this that seem somewhat inconsequential. I think it’s because the obsessive fine-tweaking of how colors and layout work eventually will allow me to make the correct guess the first time.

So while we were in Barcelona, my friend Kane had and idea to put together mixes for this blog. Each would be known as a SPECTRACIDE mix– a fresh exercise for him to sharpen his DJ skills and to bring sick music to your next party or marathon run. I agreed that the idea was awesome and told him I’d handle the cover art duties as well as I could.

Well here we are, a few months later and have his first mix of the best electro and progressive house out right now. Preview at your leisure and below or via the artwork. If you dig the mix, comment here or on soundcloud to give him some props. Tracklist is after the break, enjoy!

Spectracide Mix 001 Tracklist / 46:50

1. Felguk vs. Skrillex vs. Dada Life vs. Dirtyloud – Unleash The Scary Side (Felguk Mashup)
2. Zedd – Dovregubben (Original Mix)
3. Alex Kidd (USA) – City of Angels (Original Mix)
4. Kaskade & Deadmau5 vs. Michael Woods – Move For First Aid (Kaskade Mashup)
5. Mumbai Science – Lotus
6. Benny Benassi ft. T-Pain – Electroman (John Dalhback Remix)
7. Green Velvet – Flash (Nicky Romero Remix)
8. Nicky Romero & Apster – Bootcamp (Original Mix)
9. Dada Life – Just Bleep Me (Satisfaction) (Original Mix)
10. AutoErotique – Turn Up The Volume (Original Mix)
11. Mustard Pimp – ZHM (Dada Life Remix)
12. Sander Van Doorn – Koko (R3hab Remix)
13. Bass Kleph & Chris Arnott – We Feel Love (Tommy Trash Remix)
14. Avicii – Levels (Clockwork Remix)
15. Wolfgang Gartner – The Way It Was (Original Mix)

I owe this man my career.

I’ve tried to fathom how many others in the world feel the same way, and it’s just not possible. The number is far too high. Other prominent public figures have died in the past and I’ve never felt truly emotional at all about it… this is a first.

You will be missed Steve. If you didn’t already leave enough technological advancements in your wake, then your genius, dedication, and insanity will live on to inspire thousands in the decades to come. Rest in peace.

The point of the page is, I think, an exercise in reminding myself of the hundreds of long forgotten, logged hours. I need to remember past successes, failures, and progress. Recently I’ve began to think that keeping a verbose log like this is one of the best ways for me to become more motivated during my time off.

I’m currently working on Elan’s website for his music, and the task is getting more exciting as the trivial tasks start to go away. He’ll be touring with Modeselektor this fall in Europe. Geez. I cannot think of someone who “made it” with music as Elan has, and it’s well deserved! He’s been making beats the age of 16 and I can relate because I’ve been programming since the age of 16. I guess if you put in the time, good things do come.

Now I’m not saying this one right here is complete or amazing or anything, but I think it’s a step in the right direction. I’m calling it a night well spent. There’s a shitload of personality in that bouncing orb, oh yes there is.

I got around to giving Watch the Throne enough honest plays through (I think its like 7 now) and I definitely love the album. Kanye is really getting good at making cross-genre influenced beats… he’s no longer somewhat “stealing inspiration” from the EDM overload of the past few years. I’ll definitely have this record on repeat for a while and pick up a physical copy.

It’s nice to be able to switch back to rap & hip-hop  until Tycho drops his massive new album Dive this November and we get our ambient summer groove on. Check out the first track below.

Goodnight, internet.

Tycho – Hours [Dive LP - Nov. 2011] by Tycho

Sorry Matt, Steve, Joe, Chris… I failed you.

I’m planning on adding dedicated static sections for particular content, similar to what j.chorng has set up instead of only having a blog here. I’ve also change the way I format my blog posts to be more concise at a glance so that I can show more posts per page, and have retrofitted a lot of my previous posts. If you ever want to read the full text, it’s dynamically rendered in front of you like magic.

Alas, there’s still a lot of work to be done.

I still haven’t overhauled the existing comment system CSS, need to work on the new sections of the site, overhaul the way I present music, sprinkle some AJAX everywhere, and desperately need to dip my face into the HTML5 bandwagon every nerd on the net has a hard-on about… but this, at least visually, is a good milestone I feel.

Aside from all this pedestrian coding and getting lost in Photoshop for hours, there actually has been a lot going on lately, but I’ll save that for the next post.

Sidenote– I only tested this layout on a mac with firefox and chrome. If everything failboats on Safari and Windows, it’ll have to wait for tomorrow.

We could’ve headed over to North Beach for fireworks at Ashwin’s, but I figured since I’m only gonna be at this loft for (at most) 9 more months, there wouldn’t be another 4th of July to experience from my place. We got to see probably a half dozen “shows”… legit ones going down around the pier, as well as some pseudo-official ones around the Mission Dolores area. What was cool about being at my place though was that you got to see tons of illegal fireworks being shot off all over the neighborhood for hours before and after the official shows.

Terrarium Upgrade

I gave my terrarium some much needed love with the addition of 3 new plants and fresh ground cover. While I was in Korea/Spain, there wasn’t exactly time to take care of the moss so it all died off. I documented a couple shots with the fish eye for shits right here. Blue frog bro is lookin’ sharp.

Other than that, I’ve just been living the dream… you know: waking up relatively late, performing random errands lazily, failing to cook food for myself, etc. At least I’ve made some way on Ableton through the past week or so. Trial and error is a bitch… and so are composing melodies, making clean transitions, and thinking at all about song structure. It’s all so way in over my head. Oh well, pushing on…

Simian Mobile Disco came out with a new single named Gizzard a day or so ago and it’s nothing less than inspiring. It includes two versions of itself, along with a bonus remix. The original is definitely more gentle (if you want to call it that) progressive house / tech house that they’ve mastered at this point as far as I’m concerned. Version 2 is heavier hitting and a tad darker. Check out version 2, the remix, and a Jacques Greene original below. You may have heard that Radiohead commissioned him to remix Lotus Flower for a series of 12″ remix singles they plan on releasing.

Author insert a music with WS Audio Player.
Download (Simian Mobile Disco - 2011 - Gizzard (Version 2 Original Mix) (320k)).

Author insert a music with WS Audio Player.
Download (Simian Mobile Disco - 2011 - Gizzard (Psycatron Remix) (320k)).

Author insert a music with WS Audio Player.
Download (Jacques Greene - 2011 - Another Girl (320k)).