SHELDON'S SCENESTER FILES

The Demo, The Maxwell & Film
Review by: Sheldon Purkiss

I hadn’t been to Film Lounge in quite some time—probably over a year.  It wasn’t that I didn’t like the place with its glow in the dark yellow-brick-road floor spiraling to a centre of nothingness, or the shady lounges in the back I felt were reserved for more “assertive” folks. It was just a party I wanted to hit had never come up, so I hadn’t been until recently.  Chilling at Basement a few weeks before it closed I had been introduced to Film resident Cam Maxwell, who happens to be booked at Sydney Blu’s infamous Bitchslap! series event, THE FINAL BITCHING. However, this isn’t a DJ pump or shameless promotion.  If Cam Maxwell sucked, I’d be telling you the same story.  Luckily, he doesn’t suck.  He’s alright.  Better than alright, and my “reappearance” at Film Lounge rests almost entirely with getting to know this guy.

Demo CDs are thought by many DJs to be the bane of their existence.  There is no crowd to vibe off of, no energy to read and no club ambiance to accommodate.  A demo CD is made in a musical vacuum, taking something out of nothing and producing a cohesive piece that has to demonstrate a DJ’s abilities, show their programming choices, and produce vibe for listeners without being present or using the soulful environment of a club.  What a challenge! I had no idea until Cam invited me to sit along and watch him put together his promo CD, “Bump”. 

“Yeah yeah yeah, I’ll come over, you’ll get bored, I’ll go home—that’s how it will work” – he assured me I would find his process absolutely mind-numbing.  The opposite was true—watching Cam work through tracks, narrowing down the sound, the vibe (opener?  Mid point?  Closer?), the beats and the mixes between them was fascinating and for Cam a very time-consuming and picky one.  I could just imagine Nathan Barato going through this same process with his IntenseXS mix I picked up from him back when he opened for Roger Sanchez at This Is London in March of 2006.  Cam went through track after track—often stopping mid beat, starting two tracks back and rearranging the order with a different more powerful, or sometimes, a less powerful blend.  Off and on the sounds were compared with meticulous effort until by the end of the weekend, Cam had reached a full mix he considered a beta.

I guess there are a few reasons for to mix and hand out demos.  First and foremost it’s a promotional tool.  DJs hand out these CDs to get their name known and to prove they have the “stuff” to mix and therefore to DJ.  They hope to get gigs from handing these treasures out.  Creating the perfect mix is impossible in such a scenario, so the tracks chosen typically cover a range of genres demonstrating their prowess to play a variety of EDM sounds to the crowd with tight mixing and control over the energy throughout.  It’s then a promoter, artist buyer and/or club owner, with the CD in their drive who will come to the realization they have to get this DJ booked in their club—or so that’s what the DJs hope.

After Cam finished up his beta, he let it ride throughout the week, deciding to run the demo once more with some minor changes and coming up with the final.  Later he would ask me what I preferred, the beta or the final.  Given his personal tour of creating the beta, I was emotionally attached to the beta and still have it on my MP3 player.  An intelligent mix of Electro with vocals and massively powerful bass lines, Cam’s mix showed me I really did like Electro—when it was done right.  It tickled him pink to know he had converted me, even just a little bit.

With his mix finally perfected, like any other DJ who produces their first mix CD, Cam waits until the last moment to replicate the CD.  As the day progressed, Murphy’s Law ensued, and everything that could go wrong did go wrong, from the artwork on the front down to the track numbers on the CD itself.  In the end, it all came together (some 6-hours later) and Cam had 40 demo CDs burned and printed, looking very professional, ready for handing out during his peak hour set at Film that Saturday night.

We arrived around midnight at Film—it’s opening hour.  Damon Rush was on the decks.  I had heard him spin before and really enjoyed his set.  This night, he seemed to be playing tracks for a moment or two—nothing longer—than mixing into the next track.  It was completely opposite to what I’m used to hearing, as DJs usually take pleasure in dragging tracks out. Damon was hammering through the tracks in rapid fire, with some quick mixing to keep it sounding very smooth.  The only issue I had with this is the moment I caught a track that would start to hype me up, we’d be on the second or third track past already.  It made me feel a little anxious, all those tracks being played in such quick succession, almost against the rulebook of House.  It was OK for the opening set though, and certainly didn’t ruin anyone’s mood as those there danced it up. 

As it rolled close to 2am and Cam stepped up to the decks, the place started to fill in quickly.  Very quickly—very soon the entire place was packed, transformed in a matter of 30 minutes.  I’m told this is normal for Film.  The dark club, glow in the dark floor and cranked sound system sucked me in as Cam started unleashing his tracks on the crowd.  I hung out in the DJ booth for a little bit to watch Cam at work.  Normally a care-free easy going guy I would never guess Cam as a House-music DJ by looking at him, he was now the picture of intensity, watching the crowd, his equipment and his CDs with careful calculation while still throwing his hands up at the beats every once in a while to provide vibe to the crowd.  He put a CD into the CDJ and queued up the next track…as he mixed, he saw the floor thinning a little.  “They’re not ready for that one yet!” he yells to me over the beats, and pulls out a different gem from his CD book, deftly mixing the beats in, thickening up the primordial audio soup for people to engorge themselves upon.  The floor fills back in and I can hear Cam saying “ah, see, I knew you’d go for that.”

I took a walk around the club—it was totally rammed.  I saw JJ from Double J Entertainment—one of the promoters who’s always smiling and providing a good vibe, making sure everyone is having a good time. 
The crowd was bumping, their energy slowly building. Cam had a good hold on them. I felt the crowd while cheery, wasn’t at its peak energy—maybe a little tired.  They weren’t going ‘off’ as I would have expected given some of the tracks Cam was dropping, this was around 3:15am. 

As Cam’s set came to an end at 4am, I noticed a fresh surge of new comers into the club who seemed to bring with them more energy, hyping the existing crowd up.  As Cam closed his set, this crowd was ready to lose their minds to the next DJ, DJ Aadil with his hard Techy beats.

During his set, Cam’s friends had handed out all of his CDs, and requests for more had come on top of that.  People’s love for House music, combined with professional interest, ensured the CDs would find a good home—well worth the bother.

If you haven’t been to Film in some time, then it’s definitely time to check out their Saturday night party.  With DJs like Aadil, Damon Rush, Joey Seminara, Cam Maxwell, MC Flipside, and others, the music promises to be of high energy.

sheldon@scenestermag.com
© Scenester Magazine Inc. 2008