Born December 30, 1990.....The name is
Artaz aka Dj Pierre. Just Recently Graduated from Milford Mill Academy (Class of 08). Baltimore club music is, in many ways, an old man's game. Veterans of the genre's '80s and '90s heyday still run the scene, and often when a new name shows up on our radar as an up-and-comer to watch, he turns out to be pushing 30 with a decade-long réesumé. DJ Pierre has been showing up on more and more mixtapes and fliers over the past year."Pierre has been DJin' since the age of 9, started producin' when I was 14, 15," & took his DJ handle from his middle name, Pierre. "And just in that short amount of time, he's already released five club mix CDs, also to add to it the new Vol. 5: The Most Wanted Edition, showcasing his own beats alongside the latest hits. Meanwhile, he's been DJ'ing parties regularly on the weekends.DJ Pierre first caught the crowd attention with a remix of Three 6 Mafia's "Late Night Tip", and the popularity of that track evidently caught Pierre by surprise. "I didn't know the track was gonna be like that," he says. "Everybody started likin' it."
But the teen didn't get his big break in the scene until he got a hold of K.W. Griff's e-mail address and submitted some music that ended up in the DJ's Friday night set on 92Q. "I just sent 'em 2 tracks, to see if he got 'em ," Wilkins says. "I listened to the radio that night. I was like, 'Oh, alright. He played both of 'em, too. I was so happy--that was the first time I heard my tracks on the radio."Since then, Pierre's tracks have garnered heavy radio rotation on 92Q, and have appeared on K-Swift's popular Jumpoff mixtape series, perhaps the best showcase for a local producer to gain name recognition. His biggest hits of late 07 have been "Uhh Break," featuring a stuttering sample of Pierre's own voice over chopped-up drums from an old Rod Lee beat, and "Get High Remix," an update of K-Life's "Let's Get High" that runs the track's titular refrain through numerous filters and rhythmic variations, the latter in particular gaining favor with K-Swift, & KW Griff.Though he's young, Wilkins has got enough of a sense of history about club to reach back and fuse the classics with his own style, and keep the emphasis on the music. "Back then, people used to actually study what they doin', and now people just make tracks to make tracks, just to get 'em on the radio," he says. "Some people probably try to put the old with the new, that's what I'm tryin' to do, take some of the old stuff and put it with my style."
Still, Wilkins shows his age, and his new-school bias, when he recalls his trip to DJ in New York, where he was surprised by how behind the times out-of-town DJs were with their Baltimore club selections. "It was kinda weird. They didn't really have the updated club music like we did. Older tracks, like, wow, '30 and over crew' music," he says, referencing the popular local term for retro club music.And despite the urging of his mother, he's yet to try his hand at DJ'ing the old-fashioned way. "I know how to scratch and everything, but I was brought up on CDJ's," Wilkins says. "My mother tried and influence me with the vinyl." He shrugs. "I'm like, 'C'mon, Ma."
BE SURE TO
CHECK OUT THE PAGE FOR UPCOMING EVENTS, NEW MIXES ON THE PAGE & NEW CLUB CD
RELEASES.
NEWEST RELEASE
Vol.6 Spring Semester Edition
AVAILABLE ONLINE NOW
Vol.5 Most Wanted Edition
AVAILABLE ONLINE NOW
DJ PIERRE CLUB 30MINS.mp3 - BALTIMORES OFFICIAL DJ PIERRE
