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Born and raised in Woodside, QUEENS (80's) is where I first recall my love for the art of DJing. I lived with my grandmother at the time, and I could remember admiring my uncle so much since he lived at grandma's too. He was heavily into Hip-Hop and praised the great innovators such as Grandmaster Flash, Whodini, Doug E. Fresh, Marley Marl, Slick Rick, Kurtis Blow, Afrika Bambaataa, DJ Jazzy Jay, Cold Crush, Mantronix... just to name a few. I remember him bringing home a pair of Technics SL 1210's and was in aww everytime he'd mixed his sets. He had tons of crates filled with records of all his favs. He used to tell me if kids ever touched his turntables, they would get an electric shock, kinda his way of keeping me away from his most prized posession, I was pretty young at the time so I believed him. He would head out every weekend with his crew to DJ at the best house parties in Woodside. I used to get real upset because I wanted to tag along with him and his crew to watch them spin. On Saturday's he would always stick his speakers out the window so that everyone could hear his mixes, which I would pretend to rap over "AAAAAAA JAAAAAAY". As I got a little older, music remained an integral part of me. I hung out at parks with skaters, ravers, breakdancers, graffers (even did some myself) who all shared the same interest in underground music, and turned me on to genres such as DnB ,Trip-Hop, Urban Jazz, Acid Jazz, Breakbeat, etc. The music that I was hearing was incredible because it allowed me to experience sounds that I had never heard before. I felt the need to be around music on a continuous basis, so I would always tag along with close friends who would gather change to practice and record songs in studios. I started going to shows where my friends would perform at places like "The Spiral" in NYC, "CBGB's", "The Knitting Factory", "Castle Heights" in Queens... I was constantly meeting people who were into all types of music from all over the world. My friends introduced me to everything from Bossanova to Dub Reggae, to traditional Arabic music. We would bring our percussions to parks and form drum circles, where I would play the Doumbek. It was such a cool feeling to be able to absorb the sounds that came out of the percussive instruments of the Tablas, Djembes, Didgeridoos, that all seemed to take you on a journey out the "Concrete Jungle". Later on I was introduced to Downtempo, Jazzanova, Tango, Afrobeat, AfroLatin Funk House, which had me dragging my friends down to St. Mark's searching for artists like Guss Gus, Si*Se, Bebel Gilberto, Avatars of Dub, Gotan Project, Thievery Corporation, Up Bustle and Out, Herbie Hancock, Red Snapper, Dub as a Weapon, Omni Trio, Africanism, Los Amigos Invisibles, Antibalas, Portishead, the list can go on which is why I chose to pick up DJing... to feed the masses with my collections... to be continued...
