This Saturday will be the first Robotsound event of 2009. What better way to ring in the New Year than with some stellar sounds of the last few decades. Come be a Midnight Moroder at:
Barcade
371 N. Western
8am - 2pm.

And of course, as always, it is FREE.

So don't waste your money on mediocre DJs when you can get the real deal for nothing (although we won't turn down free drinks =P).

The RobotSound krew are proud to bring you a new night in clubbing entertainment. After searching for a while for a worthy venue, we've secured the first Saturday of each month at our new favorite neighborhood bar/arcade. No cover, no VIP/Bottle Service BS, no Hollywood parking nightmares, and [hopefully] no Hipster Scum [we've alerted the security to keep out people with ridiculous Emo haircuts, studded punker belts or if they look like this skinny-jeaned rockstar wannabe]. Just tight beats, shakin' grooves, sexy synths, cheap beer and Spy Hunter.

Sounds will be brought to you by myself, along with co-horts Georgio [aka Pollo Loco, Max], Skinjob, and occasional "special" guests. Each month will have a new theme to keep things interesting. This month we pay tribute to the undead with some unholy disco, mysterious electro and dark body music...

Saturday 11.1 [Day of the Dead]
9pm-2am
Barcade
371 N. Western Ave.
K-Town

Seems like the summer heat has rendered the 'bots at RobotSound HQ lethargic as of late. It's evident that they'd rather sit around watching bad Reality TV programming and getting their snack on than producing anything in terms of meaningful content for y'all. Nevertheless I've managed to coax them into uploading my set recorded live at the recent Hot Box Summer Solstice event. A potent synthesis of love and war, this mix attempts to address the uncertainty of the times in which we live by incorporating both the chaos of today with (hopefully) the promise of a brighter tomorrow.

HotBox 6.21.08

Shit Robot - Lonely Planet
Water Lilly - The Sleepwalker
Franz & Shape - Forgotten Days (Memory Boy Remix)
8-Bit - The Robots
Hell - Suicide Commando
Kano - It's A War
GTO - Love Is Everywhere (Live & Love Mix)
Steril - Electrostatic
The Clone Machine - Clone Machine (Empire Mix)
Der Zyklus - Roche Limit (v3)
Millimetric - Where
David Carretta - Shocktreatment
Nitzer Ebb - Murderous (Phil Kieran Mix)
6blocc - Digits
Anthony Rother - Mathematik
MOTOR - 1X1 (Phil Kieran Remix)
Kiko - Slave Of My Mind
Romina Cohn - The Night
Ectomorph - Lost Angles (Manyangles Version)

Largely a phenomenon of the 80's & early 90's, the megamix seems to be making a comeback recently. Between CBS's Megamix Contest to postings of classic megamixes on YouTube, I've noticed a resurgence of the artform. Back in the pre-digital age, the megamixes that were committed to vinyl (as opposed to homemade ones put out on cassettes and sold out of homeboys' trunks at area swap meets), were usually released through limited, unlicensed pressings or for subscription-based, DJ-only labels. Some of the larger alternative dance bands (Depeche Mode, New Order, Pet Shop Boys, etc.) had several commissioned for club use or for diehard collectors. Nowadays, music doesn't have to be manually cut and pasted from tapes to make megamixes - one can simply use some programs to sample and piece things together, and voila, instant megamix (okay, it's still a time-consuming, but not nearly as cumbersome process).

This prompted me to dig out a few mixes from the archives and rip them for your listening pleasure. Also posted are this year's CBS contest winner as well as the entry from RobotSound cohort, Pollo Loco.

Flim Flam Acid Mix

Dave Clarke Old Skool Cut Up Mix

Cocktail 83 [Il Discotto]

Digital Emotion - Super Mega Mix

Dircsen - Small Time Shot Away (CBS MMC Winner 2008)

Pollo Loco - Prepare to Qualify (CBS MMC 2008)

Stereo - Somewhere In The Night
Baby's Gang - Challenger
Ganymed - Music Takes Me Higher
Stop - Wake Up
Kano - It's War
Chromatics - In the City
I-F - Secret Desire
Lifelike & Kris Menace - Discopolis

My fellow Diskotec resident Gomes has urged me to post something about Italo since we'll be playing some at our club in two weeks. But how does one define "Italo" in 2006? One might be referring to classic Italo Disco which was made in the early 80's in Italy (where Disco hadn't died, like it had in the US mainstream market) on labels like Il Discotto, Disco Magic and Lombardini. If you want a really loose definition, you can even include the rest of European Disco (Euro Disco) and US disco in the 80's (Hi-NRG). Or, one could be referring to the new strain of Italo Electro [what you could call Italotronique), put out by people like Kiko, Oxia, The Hacker, David Carretta, Black Strobe and Vitalic (the French contingent) or by artists like I-F, Alden Tyrell, Freak Electrique, Bangkok Impact and Legowelt (the Dutch contingent). In either case, you have a similar sound that relies heavily on Moroderesque-basslines, four-to-the-floor disco beats, and huge synth melodies that make you feel like an International Deejay Gigolo. What's obvious is that today's electro superstars have clearly been influenced by the electronic space disco that was popular over 20 years ago.

Here is a short list of seminal releases that are a good way of bringing some quality Italo and Italotronique into your life: