Every week we put our trust in a DJ to curate a selection of songs that you absolutely need to hear. This week: an hour-long set of progressive house put together by Toronto producer Chris Ramos, with several of his own bootlegs and edits. This one is sure to get hands in the air.

So for this week’s Mixcast I’ve managed to coerce local Chris Ramos in to putting together an hour-long feature of the music he’s been busy producing, and the music he has been playing out (and I expect we’ll be hearing some of these tunes when we play together tonight at The Hoxton!)

Chris’ story is one which is becoming more and more typical for the cream which has been rising to the top of the electronic music scene – a classically trained pianist since a young age, found recording when he was 16, and now has the support of the fantastic local scene in Toronto that will allow him to push his original and remix production game forward.

I couldn’t be more excited; his bootleg work displays both a strong musicality, and an attention to detail. And if I’m being honest, in our industry it is absolutely about the attention to detail. Porter Robinson, who Chris has played with, said himself “it’s more about attending to small details that no one else may notice than it is about being really talented.”

What happens when you find both in one artist is something special though, and so I’m excited to see this artist’s career develop because it’s clear to me that Chris embodies both.

Chris Ramos official site

Tracklist:

1. Dirty South, Arty, Skrillex, Kaskade vs. Adam K & Dvas – Scary Monsters Walking Alone vs. Questions (Laurent Becca Re-Make)(Chris Ramos Intro Edit)

2. Dvas – Questions (Adam K Remix)

3. Deniz Koyu vs Fatboy Slim – Hertz Ya Mama (MAKJ & POLITIK Bootleg)

4. Swanky Tunes & Hard Rock Sofa vs Eric Prydz vs. Daft Punk – Harder Phantom Pjanoo (Chris Ramos Mashup vs. Nicko Vibe Bootleg)

5. Morgan Page, Sultan & Ned Shepard and BT vs. John Dahlback, Tommy Trash & Mord Fustang – Last Ride In The Air (Extravagant Bootleg)(Chris Ramos Edit)

6. Gabrielle Aplin – Home (Chris Ramos Remix)

7. Martin Solveig, Madeon, A-Trak – The Night Out (Chris Ramos Edit)

8. Labrinth ft. Tinie Tempah & Benny Benassi vs. Rihanna – Where Has The Earthquake Been (Chris Ramos Mashup)

9. Daniel Carelli – Takeover

10. Felguk vs. Autoerotique- Jack Up The Volume(DBL’s p.HI Masher)

11. Nari & Milani – Kendo

12. Porter Robinson – Language

13. Tiesto & Mark Knight feat. Dino – Beautiful World (Gina Star Remix)

14. Glad You Came 2Night (Fero Vs. Dzeko & Torres Edit)

15. Mark Mendes, Paris & Simo – Aura (Original Mix)

16. Disfunktion – Galette (Incognet Remix)

Dzeko & Torres are hot, though despite releasing several massive bootlegs over the last couple months it has taken ages for them to take off.

But take off they have – their remix for Of Monsters and Men has received nearly 30,000 plays and 10k downloads just in the last week!

This is another track that has been overlooked, which I’ll definitely be incorporating in to my set this Saturday at The Hoxton in Toronto.

Here’s a brand new moombah-tinged remix from Crookers via the good folks @ Mixmag! This one’s got sweaty hip gyrations written all over it and that’s a good thing considering festival season is right around the corner. Yeah, that’s right, time to wip out the Raybans and slather yourself in sunscreen! I bet you’re just dying of anticipation (sarcasm intended).

Oh, and in case you missed it Crookers released an album in October of last year called “Dr. Gonzo” which you can stream here.

Torro Torro were on the road last month, with several dates across the US including several at SXSW 2012 – check out our Moombahton Massive coverage – and Miami during Ultra and MMW.

This track was (mostly) done in the car while they were on that road-trip, and is the greasiest big-room electro/house track they’ve put together to date.

As usual, their trademark vocal sampling plays an important role, and their drums are BIG as ever. They’ve also incorporated some somewhat exciting sound design in their various synths.

The list of remixing artists on The Night Out EP is pretty stacked, but I have to say.. my favourite is definite Finnish producer Lenno own nu-disco flip of Martin Solveig’s summer sing-along anthem. A-Trak & Madeon also have strong remixes, but Lenno’s is the one I’d be likeliest to play out in a DJ set.

Devon Potter, aka Strobehypnoticz, just released his second EP for free on his Facebook page. The four-track effort is called Infinite, and features a mix of progressive and electro house influences. With an average song length clocking in around 7 minutes you ought not to be expecting to hear these in the club any time soon, but it was a great way to start my day and it’s amazing to see Potter continue to up his production game.

Vancouver moombahton ambassador Ziad from 110BPM here. One of the pioneers of moombahton, Munchi, recently played a show in Vancouver and wanted to share the experience (along with exclusive excerpts from my interview with him) with Cal and the rest of Salacious Sound. 

If you’re not familiar with Munchi (shame on you!), here are a two of my favourite tracks to get you acquainted:

The first thing I immediately noticed when I got to Republic was that a lot of the people there definitely weren’t from the moombahton or even EDM scene. With $12 cover the night before a long weekend there must have been a lot of door traffic. I know what you’re thinking and yes, I know that $12 cover for a normal Canadian club is ridiculous. This is Vancouver.

...and this is Republic's light-up bar

To my disappointment the opening DJ didn’t play a single moombahton track, but the performance that followed more than made up for that. Arriving straight from the plane, Munchi got behind two shiny CDJ 2000s right away and put his CDs in. Singing and dancing along to every track, Munchi’s energy immediately transferred over to the 400 shuffling club-goers and got them moving right away.

If you’ve never seen a Dutch man with a giant ‘fro and an ever bigger grin on his face jump up and down, shouting “Mother-fucker!” along with lyrics… it puts a smile on your face. What I loved at this show was that instead of the typical ‘build and drop/melt your face’ off’ style that I’m accustomed to hearing at most shows he pulled off one hell of a rhythmic, high-energy set.

Now, I’ve been to a lot of shows in my 22 years of life and this was the first time I’d ever seen 6’3″ Persians with silver chains and girls in little leather jackets all dancing alongside each other and enjoying the music equally as much. In fact, instead of the usual situation where the line is dead by 12am-12:30am, it was constantly busy whether it was 1am, 1:30am, 2am, and even later people were still flocking to the club… I guess that’s what word of mouth can do for a show.

Hands down favourite point of the night? An unreleased remix of The Final Countdown. I don’t use this expression often, but people seriously went ham. Two days later, I sat down with Munchi to talk about the experience:

First off, I was at the show and I don’t think there’s any question that people loved it.

Munchi (M): “You were there? Why didn’t you come say hi. After the gig I was talking to everybody at the show.”

Ziad (Z): “Haha, well I tried talking to you, but Jason said you just got off the plane so I wanted to give you some time.”

M: “Aw, naw man, that’s not that big of a deal. I just like talking to everybody. I could tell that there were a lot of people coming that weren’t in the moombahton scene or weren’t used to going to Republic and everyone came together and had a good time it looked like. That’s why I went out into the crowd after to thank everybody for coming out because I could tell that a lot of them came out of there element and had a good time regardless.”

That’s actually something Republic is trying to get past, this perception that it’s a Top 40 club or a club for a select group of people.

M: “For real?!”

Z: “Yeah, recently there’s been a big push to expand their audience. They’ve got a successful reggae night on Sundays, and Tuesdays they do drum n bass/jungle, and now they’re really pushing new artists to come do Thursday shows.”

M: “That’s good shit, it’s always good to bring different crowds together.”

And what do you think of the layout of republic?

M: “It was weird, it’s in the middle of the air. Downstairs was crazy, upstairs everybody was judging and I felt really peer pressured, you know?”

What was Fortune like? I know that you weren’t on the bill until the last minute, was it strange playing for people that don’t know your music?

M: “Aw, no, it’s all good, dude. I actually prefer to play in front of people who don’t know my shit and then I try to convince them… but sadly, it didn’t work this time…

Z: “Really?!”

M: “I mean, it worked up until a certain extent, but when I started playing moombahcore they were like ‘nah, fuck that shit,’ haha. I don’t mind though, I was like ‘fuck it,’ you know?”

————————————————————————————————-

I hope you all enjoyed my expose of Munchi’s debut show in Canada. If you want to read the rest of the interview it’s all on Moomba+ for your viewing pleasure, and if you live in or around Vancouver and want to talk moombahton (shows, tracks, whatever) don’t hesitate to send me a message through my Facebook page.

The Republic show was made possible by the great guys at the Donnelly Group, as well as 110BPM, Winnie Cooper, and Vancouver’s Very Own. To see more photos from the event, head over here.

Lastly, Moombah+ has a swell Facebook group that you can keep up with us on:

- Ziad

Sir Nenis is one of several known aliases of Top Billin president and producer/DJ Nenis. Last month he released his Freaks EP via Trax Records, for sale on Bandcamp and other digital retailers.

The EP includes an impressive remix package, featuring flips by Wax Motif & Neoteric, So Called Friend, Hornets, Wolfhaus, and Femme En Fourrure.

My favourite out of the EP is the Wax Motif & Neoteric remix. Their track sounds the biggest and baddest, and has a ton of movement and dynamic range. This talented pair has always been solid artistically + creatively, and this track is world-class in terms of production quality.

As a special treat, Trax has released the Freaks Dub for free download!

One of the biggest tracks I brought back from me was Bumaye – the song that started the Dillon Francis + Diplo back to back set I wrote about.

Well when I was at SLOWED the other night – a monthly jam hosted by Torro Torro – when the residents were opening for DMC legend DJ Craze I heard this fantastic moombahton edit.

I trust you’ll all enjoy it as much as I did! And the best part is Wessel S has offered it as a free download!!

Wessel S on Soundcloud

Dzeko & Torres have just finished up a tour with several dates across the U.S., and have used what I’m sure is a brief respit at home in Toronto to drop the eighth installment of their Selection Podcast. It clocks in at 55 minutes, and is a solid overview of everything you can expect to hear at the festivals this summer, including their hands-up + euphoria-inducing bootleg of King and Lionheart by Of Monsters and Men which they offered for free download a few weeks back – you can find that player below the tracklist!

Tracklist:
1. Swedish House Mafia – Greyhound (Original Mix)
2. Nari & Milani – Atom (Original Mix)
3. Thomas Gold Vs. Chocolate Puma – Sing 2 Whohadchants (Sebastian R Mashup)
________________________________
**FORGOTTEN TRACK OF THE MONTH**
4. Adrian Lux feat. The Good Natured – Alive (Basto Remix)
________________________________
5. Madonna vs. Avicii – Girl Gone Wild (Avicii Remix)
6. Of Monsters and Men – King and Lionheart (Dzeko & Torres Streesh Bootleg)
7. Arty, Matisse & Sadko – Trio (Original Mix)
8. Third Party ft. Cicada – Feel (Original Mix)
9. Laidback Luke, Norman Doray & Arno Cost – Trilogy (GTA Bigroom Mix)
10. Swanky Tunes & Hard Rock Sofa – Apogee (Original Mix)
11. Mark Knight – Alright (Original Mix)
________________________________
**DEEP SECTION**
12. Adana Twins – Strange (Original Mix)
________________________________

On March 26th, UK trio Dark Sky released their Black Rainbows EP on vinyl. No word on when or where the digital release will be available, but you can currently purchase the record from the following retailers:

Chemical: http://bit.ly/yBxBqA
Boomkat: http://bit.ly/FPM8Bu
Juno: http://bit.ly/FRddns

The EP is some of their finest work to-date. It is extremely forward-looking in terms of both their sound design and off-beat, sometimes extremely complex + other times spacious percussion. Can’t wait to get my hands on the mp3s!

This club-ready remix of ‘Where Have You Been’, off Rihanna’s album ‘Talk That Talk’, comes courtesy of Hardwell. It’ll be out on Def Jam, likely soon (date still TBA).

Nicky Romero just hit 100k fans on Facebook, and in celebration has given away a hotly-requested track he’s been playing “as a bootleg” in his sets for the last year. Big congrats are due to Romero! I have been really in to his production lately, and I appreciate his versatility – it seems no matter what feel I’m going for in my set, be it opener or peak time, his tracks usually find their way in to my set!!

Nicky Romero on Soundcloud | Facebook

One of our favourite remixers, Mr. Larsson, has just released a new interpretation of Marina and the Diamonds’ song Primadonna. Every one of this guy’s party-focused tracks over the last year or more has found its way in to my DJ sets, and this one will definitely be getting some airplay as well.

Check him out on Soundcloud, and check out our other articles on the guy – we’ve published lots of Larsson gold over the years!!

I haven’t been able to stop listening to trap shit (and anything that sounds like it) since I got back from SXSW. There’s something about it down South that works so well with dance music. Almost every set I listened to over the course of that week included some, and I must say it really opened my mind – the way that people get down to it in clubs alongside really highly curated house music impressed me a great deal. I’ve always been a fervent backpacker, but I can really sink my teeth in to some of this stuff (as long as I’m selective).

And this is one of those fine selections.

If there’s ever been an artist more content to just let the music do the talking, I haven’t heard of her/him. Hype Jones may have a profile on soundcloud just stupid enough to suck you in – see profile image below, or read his shouty all-caps bio on Soundcloud with a collection of more fantastic tracks – but make no mistake, this isn’t your typical startup producer struggling to make it. Jones has the experience of over a decade in the record industry and impressive skills in the studio.

He also has a collection of accolades. In the last few years he has produced remixes for Dev, Enrique, and Lil Wayne, released originals on Spinnin and cr2, and had his tracks supported by the likes of Tiesto and the Swedish House Mafia.

His latest two tracks are beauties – epic progressive house burners both, each with soaring vocals from a pair of impressive vocalists Myah Marie and Mario Vazquez.

http://twitter.com/TheHypeJones
https://twitter.com/#!/myahmarie

Look at your producer, now back to Hype Jones. He’s on a horse.

Every week we put our trust in a DJ to curate a selection of songs that you absolutely need to hear. This week: 26 minutes of fast-paced, heavy, bouncy dance grooves from New York label boss and heavy bass champion of the world Drop the Lime.

This week’s Mixcast features a minimix put together by Luca Venezia for RAUW, featuring some exciting tracks upcoming on Trouble & Bass in 2012. Zombies For Money and Party Crashers have their tracks featured, ‘Boom! Boom!’ and ‘Brooklyn VIP’ respectively. Also featured is Drop the Lime’s upcoming remix of AC Slater’s ‘Sidewinder’, and a couple special remixes of Shake Baby Shake and Bandit Blues.

While I love listening to Luca’s DJ sets, where he really shines as an artist is in his live sets played with the band. It gives the audience a way to connect with the music, and understand visually what’s going on. It’s a spectacle. Luca’s vocals are incredible. And last but not least, there’s something special about hearing a song you love played live – perhaps it’s a feeling that this is a ‘version’ made just for you, completely unique, that no one will ever hear again, or maybe it’s the rawness that it imbues his tunes with which is appealing.

The one thing we can be certain of is that Trouble & Bass artists are indeed living up to the war cry “Heavy Bass Champions of the World” in 2012.

Tracklist:

1. Sir Nenis – Freaks (So Called Friend Remix)
2. Housquare – Onyx feat. Modek
3. Thunderbird Juicebox – Peanut Butta 2012
4. Junkie XL feat Isis Salam – Off The Dancefloor (NT89 Remix)
5. Todd Edwards – This Generation
6. Zombies For Money – Boom! Boom!
7. Feadz & Kito – Oh Yeah
8. D1 – Whiskey & Coke
9. Drop The Lime – Shake Baby Shake (Slap In The Bass remix)
10. Party Crashers – Brooklyn VIP
11. Foamo – Sherlock
12. Rustie – City Star
13. AC Slater – Sidewinder (Drop The Lime remix)
14. Drop The Lime – Bandit Blues (Night Version)
15. Vato Gonzalez & Diplo – Rasclat Riddim

Draper is a producer from the UK that has been active for several years in online remix communities like Indaba, with several accolades including a top fifteen release on iTunes.

He released an eponymous 5-track EP on February 1st exclusively through Drop Dead Clothing with a limited run t-shirt/CD available. His self-described euphoric, summery, 8-bit sounding songs combine the familiarity of modern dubstep with delightfully soothing melodies, and some special sample-tidbits for careful listeners, especially those who are fans of Sonic the Hedgehog.

You can purchase the whole EP on bandcamp, and from CD/iTunes/Spotify.

You can listen to the whole EP here, and Draper has also given us permission to give away Painting the Sky!

Soundcloud.com/DraperMusic
http://www.facebook.com/drapermusic
Twitter: @DraperMusic

Draper - Illusion

Draper - Painting The Sky (Radio Edit) (feat. Madame Luxe)

Draper - Triller

Draper - The Storm

I have been anticipating this release of Viceroy‘s third instalment of his ‘Jet Life’ series since he announced he would be remixing this 90′s R&B classic by Mark Morrison in March.

I cant think of anyone better than Viceroy to get us in the mood for spring and summer right around the corner.

Also check out the Moombahton remix by Dave Edwards on SalaciousSound

They did it again! These guys keep on wheelin’ those tracks in! This latest track by Wheel Wells is a remix of a cover of a classic and I’m sure ‘The King’ himself would be proud of it’s reincarnation.

If these two keep up this streak of genius, you would be a fool indeed if you can’t help falling in love with these guys.