Where are you based?
San Francisco Bay Area.
Where do you work? What do you do?
Paradise Americas – Managing Director / Dirtybird – Label Manager.
What are you listening to?
It’s Friday while I’m writing this, which is release day, so my usual routine of heading over to a couple key shops to check out the releases that are live to see which releases were featured, and any other new tracks from other artists and labels. I usually just press play on a bunch in the background as I do work.
How do you discover new music?
Depends on if I’m in my office or in my car…
I get a lot of demos and promos. I usually download them as they come in straight to my Downloads folder. That way, when I’m working at my desk answering emails or whatever, I just press play through the list and delete or save. There’s currently 939 files in there and it never seems to end. I got it down to about 50 a few years ago.
If I’m in my car, it’s Spotify’s Release Radar and Discover Weekly and it’s barely any ‘dance music’ in the literal sense. I’ve been a paid member since the inception of Spotify, so my algo is pretty dialled in. I tend to find that Discover Weekly is usually more on the money than Release Radar. If I like it I’ll save and add it to a playlist I have called “The Ill-Na-Na”. I barely make it through both playlists in a week. If I do, though, and still want to listen to music I just press shuffle on this playlist.
What formats do you usually listen to? LP, CD, Cassette, Digital, Streaming Services? Why?
Pretty much only streaming or digital files. I sold most of my vinyl about 8 years ago but still have a few hundred that I’ll never get rid of and bust out every now and then.
Where do you do most of your music listening?
Mainly at home while I work. When I’m not in front of my computer I don’t listen to much music – but I am in front of my computer the majority of the day so quite a bit gets played.
Unless my wife is home and she’s usually our household DJ and plays all her disco (often on repeat…)
How do you find and listen to pre-release music?
Outside of promos I receive, I don’t really listen to pre-release streams or first listens – I might check out a clip on IG from a label or artist I’m into, but not too much.
What are your frustrations with listening to music digitally? Any benefits?
Demo or promo links that aren’t downloads. As I mentioned, I will download it right away to come back to listen to late. I don’t want to stream something and then request a download if I like it.
Also having an ad-free Spotify takes any pain out of streaming.
How do you keep track of everything you are listening to?
When I like a track I download, I have a color-coded system in my Finder. Yellow is a demo I’m interested in, Blue is deep/moody house, Grey is for harder edge, left-field sounds, Purple is disco/indie dance, and if it’s Red, then it’s the hot shit.
“I have a color-coded system in my Finder – Yellow is a demo I’m interested in, Blue is deep/moody house, Grey is harder edge, left-field sounds, Purple is disco/indie dance, and if it’s Red, then it’s the hot shit.”
Do you tip other people off to new music? How?
Not as much as I should since so much music passes through my orbit. A few times a month if I come across a song that reminds me of someone that I think they’ll like, I’ll shoot them a link to it.
I also send out some pre-promo tracks to DJs or other tastemakers if I think it’s right up their alley to give them a secret weapon to play.
Anything you want to “promote”?
For the deeper, chill vibe Joshua Iz has started to release music again on his Vizual label and just put out an album “Love I/O” that is one of the few things I play more than once. He also put out a super sick Dub album under his alias Cookie Ranks that’s really great.
For an absolute banger, Dillon Marinez’s “Wormhole” is one of my favourite tracks this year. The main synth bassline is so crazy and in your face. I’ve seen it get some of the biggest reactions in the club when played.
For the indie-dance jams, SF’s Roam Recordings puts out quality after quality.
Then for undiscovered talent, there’s this old-school underground house DJ/Producer, Dirty Sole. Coming ouut of Chicago they started making more cross-over type records and they’re produced so well and really fun tracks.
Finally, with the crazy, left-field genre-bending stuff, Justin Jay’s Fantastic Voyage has been groundbreaking in some of the music they’re releasing.
