Dan still loves his techno, progressive, whatever-you-call-it as much as ever, but in the last year or so has got together with two old Boston friends (Borkan & Chassin) to form a Devastator-like DJ group that goes by the odd name “Rich Uncle Skeleton.” During his good ole’ college days, Dan had a slight obsession with various electro artists (Ladyton, Felix Da Housecat, The Hacker, etc.) but never spun them much outside of house parties. Now he’s got back into the style and has put together a couple of fun party mixes to change it up a bit. Get the 2009 Electro mix here.
After countless delays and re-designs the DJ section of danalcala.com is back. There are loads of samples to listen to and some songs and mixes to download. With web 2.0 social networking so big now the personal website seems almost like a thing of the past but we personally enjoy having something that is (somewhat) unique and personal. There will be loads more music to come very shortly :-)
One of the many exciting events that happened in the last couple of months was the first official remix Dan did for the up-and-coming Greek DJ/Producer Distant Fragment (Nick Tsitlakidis). Dan was contacted by Nick after being impressed with Dan’s first (sort-of) original track, ‘Why So Serious?’ The remix ‘Full of Color’ was released in April and is available to buy here. Look for Nick’s first full album to be released later this year. Look for more tune’s by Dan soon too.
One of 2009's pop hottest albums has come from French band, Phoenix. Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix is clever, catchy and so too is the album's first single, 1901. They were nice enough to put the music stems online and Dan remixed it with a sound inspired by The Cars, Stuart Price and the 80s. It's a departure from Alcala's other productions but we think you'll enjoy it anyway. Download here.
Ah YouTube. You go on looking for one little video and before you know you're sucked into a maze of others and 2 hours have gone by! Being an art student in college, Dan studied a variety of creative media and one his favorites was film and video editing. Now armed with a brand new iMac that can handle the demanding CPU, Dan has put together a collection of videos. Some are silly, some are crazy video remixes, and others are just plain classic. Check out the full page here.
Over the past few months, the party animal DJ Crew known as Rich Uncle Skeleton have been busy remixing forgotten classics like Mötley Crüe's Dr. Feelgood or Tanto Metro & Devonte's Everyone Falls in Love. Their sound is a mix of electro, house and rave but they like to simply classify it as "party music". They're currently working on a monthly club night in NYC. Check out their remix EP here and some videos here.
One of our favorite production duos of all-time has to be Röyksopp. Classics like Remind Me and their remix of Mekon stand out some of the best (and most fun) dance tunes of all time. They recently put up the remix parts to Tricky Tricky off their new album Junior. As if that's not good enough, the song features vocals from another all-time favorite, The Knife's vocalist, Karin Dreijer Andersson. Dan has slowed things down and made the vibe quite dark. Listen to Alcala's hauntingly beautiful remix here.
I've always been a fan of Oliver Koletzki. His tracks are always pretty melodic and really organic sounding especially for a Berlin techno producer. Hypnotized is much more on the pop side of his normal stuff but I think it works really well. I tried to make mine a little bit darker and on the dubby side. I'm really happy with how it turned out. Here's the vocal mix and here's the dub mix.
Another remix contest? Yeah, I know, I need to finish up some original material but I couldn't resist this catchy tune from Toronto's finest electro pop band. It's hard to remix a song that you really like but I think I was able to add little bits and pieces to make it a tad more party worthy. You can download the mp3 at the contests's page and I hate to ask, but if you do really like it, please give me a heart. As always, thanks for the support and I hope you like it!
It's been a while since I put together a proper mix. This is on the dark, techy side with lots of melodies and atmosphere. The mix features tracks by some of my favorite producers like The MFA, Dominik Eulberg, Gui Boratto and others to keep your eyes on. The full track list is embedded in the file and you can download the full mix here. Keep warm!
Hypnotize has aways been one of my favorite rap tracks of all time. It's just so "cool" sounding and still sounds fresh to me. Well, about 2 years ago when I started getting back into producing again this is one of the first songs I tried bootlegging. It never quite felt right (you can hear an early version at the end of this mix. I recently gave it another listen and thought I could make a cool dub out the instrumental because the vocals just didn't seem to fit with what I was doing. Judge for yourself. Listen & Download here.
Here's a quick little (45 minutes) downtempo mix I did the other day. I just realized I've never recorded a downtempo/chill out mix before and I don't know why that is! I really love this kind of stuff and will make an effort to do more like this. I really love how this one ends. Enjoy! Download here.
I don't quite know what to make of Lady Gaga. I think it's cool how big she's become and she seems a lot more self-made than other pop stars but I find a lot of her songs have annoying repetitive chorus' thats sole purpose is to get stuck in your head. Hence why you won't hear ra-ra-ra in this mix but I like the original and gave remixing this a shot. I'm proud I was able to re-create some of the original sounds here and it ended up sounding better than I imagined with just a poorly ripped youtube acapella. Download remix here. Download dub mix here. Watch video here.
I just discovered this cool site called mixcloud. You can host as many mixes (not single tracks) as you'd like for free. No downloading, podcast or timeline comment features but maybe they'll add those in the future. You can always download all the mixes I've done since 2003 (has it been that long?) on here of course but here's my mixcloud page.
Wow, great news! I'm proud to announce that I was picked by Dragonette as the winner of their MXP4 remix contest. The competition was intense, as their were a number of fantastic remixes to choose from but somehow I made it. Thank you so much to everyone who voted and I really hope this leads to bigger and better things. It is definitely motivating me to work harder on new tracks and keep improving my skills. You can listen and download here. Watch the video here.
Daft Punk need no introduction. They've been a huge influence on me (even if I don't think as highly of them after this). I'm all about sampling but only to a certain limit. But either way they are still awesome and this remix is sort of hip hop take on the original. It took me forever to figure out the piano parts but it was very satisfying to do too :) Take a listen.
Another guilty pop pleasure. Maneater was in big rotation back in 2006 when I was working at Harvard Square in Cambridge. I had the chopped up vocals on my HD for a long time. I'm very pleased I was able to make it all work with a fat basline and electro synths. Download the song. Watch the music video.
Back in the summer of 2002 Sasha debuted Airdrawndagger and I was blown away. It's a pretty mellow album for the most part, but Bloodlock is the exception. Hard and driving but also very melodic. There's no doubt James Holden was in the driver's seat for this one. My take on it is very spacey and atmospheric. Download the song. Get tripped out by the 2001: Space Odyssey video.
In the past few months I've really really been getting into this nu disco, dream pop, 80s sounding stuff. I have no idea what the official genre is named but I love it. I want to go out, buy vintage synths and make this kind of music! I put this mix together to show my love. I'm very happy about the Double Dragon 2 cover too. Another beloved relic from the 80s. Download the mix here.
I'm a huge Crystal Castles fan! I've listened to both CC albums countless times. For months I've had a rough version of 'Air War' on my HD but haven't been able to figure out what to do with it. Fortunatly, as soon as I heard Celestica I fell in love and wanted to try a remix. I'm really proud of it and even made a second ambient version. This also marks another small accomplishment in that I'm finally on the hype machine! Give me some hearts if you're a member :)
Celestica MP3
Celestica music video
Kevinsky is an amazing French producer who makes tracks that could be used for any 80s action movie... but better! With my remix I kept it very straight forward. It's about as simple as I get but I like how it sounds. Some of the backup vocals for missing from the remix parts so my friend Mr. Boneyo Hunt provided some spookily close sounding ones. Enjoy! Nightcall MP3. Nightcall music video.
This guy is the biggest thing in trance since 2 minute long breakdowns. I'm pretty sure he's more popular now than all the Dutch DJs and PvD so that is quite impressive. I'm not crazy about most of his work but the melodies in Strobe are just beautiful. I just bought this new synth called Chipsounds. It makes wonderful NES & 8-bit sounds and this remix is my first test run with it. Download my remix here. Watch the music video here.
If you were a boy growing up in the early 90s you probably recognize this face. The Ultimate Warrior might be one of the most intense human beings ever. I have enjoyed watching all his old fight promos online lately and thought it would be great to try and remix him somehow. Then it hit me. Pon De Floor by Major Lazer! One of the most fun songs to come out in recent years. Watch the video here! This has been featured on some great websites too! Check it on Mad Decent, Omgea Level, and Knotoryus
It's been one of the hottest Summer's I can remember. I've had the AC cranked non-stop since June I think. Anyway, nothing beats a summer mix either. This one was really fun to put togther. If you're reading this somewhere cold or at another time of the year don't worry. It still sounds good and something to chillout to without being too ambient or abstract. Download here. You can listen online here too.