Page 11 - Zone Magazine Issue 030 - Lexicon Avenue

Dear Zone Readers
I pray these words find you well at this time in your life. As this is now the first article for me as a writer, not a DJ or music producer, I hope you can take anything of value form this time you spend reading these words.
I hope everyone reading this is in good health in body, mind and spirit. That last article was a brief part one history of DJ'ing from my west coast (California) point of view.
We left off in our last article as the 1990’s saw the explosion of house, techno, progressive and trance music in the USA and Europe.
By 1990, the eighties had created two relevant sounds. These were hip-hop and (dance) house. Major labels were now signing house artists and remixers as smaller house labels were keeping the records plants busy. Vinyl was everywhere. Labels such as Atlantic, Epic, Warner Brothers and Sony were even having a house remix on a majority of the their commercial artists. House producers were now getting paid very many thousands of dollars for a remix. Also, the “rave “ culture was gaining huge momentum and created many super stars. Even drum and bass and downtempo/acid jazz was moving vinyl. All these wonderful types of DJ vinyl could be found in specialized dj records stores. There, and only there could you find the music that came to the docks every week form around the globe of press pressed vinyl.
It was a very exciting time. There was no relative Internet and no cd players used in respectable clubs in the early 90’s. A DJ needed to invest money (at least $50 per week) to stay on top. Also a label producer needed to put up at least $500 to make a record with a few white label test pressings. Even I must say that when early cds started to be burned by home producers I very seldom listened to it.
If you wanted to be taken serious, you needed to have your art on vinyl.
However as things evolved, cd’s began to take over. Although there were many large disputes about the sound quality, even international DJ's; were finding it easier to records their vinyl to cd as well as test new productions the same day on cd.
There was a huge trade off for us traveling not to need to care such a large load of records (at least 2 bags weighing 45lbs each) not to mention the airlines would make you check at least one if not 2 bags of your irreplaceable vinyl only to find 1 or both do not show up at your final destination!
Note: that happened to me once and I had to use the resident DJs vinyl. That is embarrassing. With cds you could always now carry on a folder full of hours of music.
As 2000’s came, vinyl sales had dropped drastically and now everyone could get DJ music for a few dollars or free. The number of producers skyrocketed as well as productions a week. Every on who can make noise or music was now able to sell their product or give it away adding to the plethora of music out there. Thus we now are in a new phase of dj’ing and music making.
One good thing is that no one can be denied the opportunity to create!
Please send emails to: eddie@zone-magazine.eu
Kindly
Eddie Amador
It’s a Spiritual Thing , A Body Thing, a Soul Thing!