RiffSpot is the music industry’s newest concept in dance music promotion. They offer an innovative and effective service for record labels, independent artists and music industry professionals worldwide. RiffSpot facilitates distribution of digital music releases from top record labels to 1000’s of carefully selected club DJs, radio producers, A&R professionals and media outlets.
RiffSpot focuses on two main audiences; Record labels/Independent artists and top music industry professionals. Both get a fantastic and unique service whatever their needs. Record labels and independent artists can rely on RiffSpot to distribute their forthcoming releases to music industry professionals that have an influence within their music genre. Each professional on the books is vetted to ensure they’re able to provide significant exposure for each release. Also you can supply your own list of music industry contacts to RiffSpot and these contacts will also receive the promo allowing you to track your efforts from one single place. Once professionals have received your promo, they will preview and rate your music prior to downloading it. This means that you gain access to insightful
feedback in real time, allowing you to visualise the reception of each track.
RiffSpot’s second target audience of music industry professionals includes individuals such as club and radio DJs, A&R, bloggers, journalists and reviewers. Tastemakers can register with RiffSpot for FREE. With the added advantage, unlike other services, that promos are offered in both 320Kbps MP3 format and CD Quality WAV format, professionals can be assured they are getting the highest quality downloads. All downloads are supplied with information sheets, cover artwork and are correctly tagged ready to be used straight away.
The best thing about RiffSpot is that for record labels and independent artists, it eliminates the enormous cost of conventional promo distribution. Whilst you would normally have to spend money on CD manufacturing, mailing and the staff to organise it; the entire process is shifted to the internet for a fraction of the cost! Also, for all of your releases, RiffSpot will use digital watermarking technology to encode every single download with a unique tracking code. This is done to protect your content and allows you to be safe in the knowledge that if your track gets shared illegally, you will be able to gather the evidence necessary to make a legal prosecution.
As a special launch offer, RiffSpot are offering record labels and independent artists who register their interest at http://www.riffspot.co.uk before the 1st November, 1 month’s free trial of the service! They also still have space on their books for more tastemakers so remember all club and radio DJs, A&R, bloggers, journalists and reviewers, you can sign up for free at http://mip.riffspot.co.uk
For more information on any or the services offered by RiffSpot contact info@riffSpot.co.uk
The British Music Experience is excited to present a unique chance to interact with one of the UK’s most successful DJ and Producer teams, the Freemasons.
On Thursday 26th November James Wiltshire (left of picture), Producer half of the dance duo will be presenting the music-making techniques that have made the Freemasons the most in demand dance DJ ’s, Producers and Remixers of the moment.
From producing massive dance hits of their own including ‘Love on my Mind’, ‘Rain Down Love’ and the anthem ‘Uninvited’ feat. Bailey Tzuke, to remixing Whitney Houston’s comeback smash- ‘Million Dollar Bill’, to Kelly Rowland’s ‘Work’, Beyonce & Shakira’s ‘Beautiful Liar’, to producing for Kylie and Sophie Ellis Bextor.
The Freemasons have led the way for dance and house music production and remixing. James will be explaining and taking questions on how they go about creating their trademark sounds in studio and live, including the software and kit they use and how they exploit it. How they got started in music production, started getting access to samples and vocals and how they begun to collaborate with big artists.
Freemasons Music Masterclass Thursday 24th November Start: 6.30pm Get Tickets Now
Hosted by Gaydar Radio’s Maria Peters, this amazing unique evening will give you the chance to meet the individuals behind the music. Find out first-hand how it’s put together and tips for the route to successful production, plus behind the scenes of working with some of the most famous artists of our time.
Following on from my previous post about the 30 Beats Competition, one of my good friends from showmethelab.com has put forward his entry and I’d like you to take a minute to listen to the track and cast your vote for him please.
Tim, who loves to play the drums, studied at Alchemea, college of Audio Engineering and has been working in the music industry for many years. He has also made his own chill out and Drum and Bass albums but this is the first time he has made anything with car sounds!
Tom Upton & Mark Masters proudly presents SHAKEDOWN @ HaHa, Guildford on Saturday 26th September. A new night to tingle those senses and take you on a trip through the biggest and best in all kinds of house music.
These 2 professional djs will be on hand to deliver you the best in Sexy, Funky, Electro House music all night long!!!!
“Starting off the night with some sexual funky house flavours, moving into some upfront funky electro, then working our way up to those big funky bangers and then climaxing in a fountain of uplifting vocal electro for all of you who wish to dance the night away to REAL music!!!”
Free Entry throughout the night, CD giveaways, and photo’s being taken! This is going to be an awesome night!
Don’t forget to invite your friends! Hope to see you there!
Ha Ha bar & grill
16 - 17 North Street
Guildford,
GU1 4AF Map
I’m not ashamed to admit that yes I am a big fan of Calvin Harris. I went to go see him live at Thekla in Bristol earlier this year, I saw him supporting for Tiesto in victoria Park and I’m off to see him again live on the 19th October this year plus I’ve chatted to him on the phone too.
At the Thekla gig, I thought I would show my support for Calvin Harris and his amezzin music by making my own Calvin Harris Fly Eye Glasses. Other people at the gig did the same but their efforts were not as good as mine So I thought I would share my tips in creating a new set of glasses for his forthcoming live gig in a few weeks time.
Things You Will Need:
Pair of cheap sunglasses
UHU Glue
12mm Gemstone Beads
The cheap sunglasses I picked up for a quid at my local Primark.
UHU glue was about a quid from WHSmiths
The 12mm CLEAR Gemstone beads were bought in bulk off ebay from this supplier for a few pounds.
Start of by giving yourself plenty of space in a well ventilated area. UHU glue tends to whiff a bit also it can get a little messy at first so make sure you have a damp cloth nearby.
Make sure you have enough beads to complete your glasses before you start. I used 18×12mm beads per eye in this example. Depending on the style of glasses you pick up, allow 50 beads per pair of fly eye glasses you wish to make.
Dab a small amount of glue on to the back of the gemstone. Trust me when I say that less is more. you want a small glob in the middle of the gemstone rather than a thin layer all over. Allow the glue 30 seconds or so to go off a little bit then press gently onto the lens of your sunglasses. It should stick and stay in place pretty securely.
Using the same method, apply more gemstones to your lens. Start at the top corner nearest the nose bridge and work your way along the top to complete your first row.
Once the second row of gemstones are added, work your way around the outside edge of the frame before finally adding gems to the central area. This will allow you to judge for an even covering of gems and will help stop it looking like a mess by keeping the gems in some kind of order.
Don’t worry too much about pushing the gems tight against each other because a few small gaps in between will actually help you to see out of them once they are finished. This is another reason why I would reccomend opting for the 12mm gems so that there is a large enough gap between each one to achieve the effect you want while still being able to see out.
Once one side of the Calvin Harris Fly Eye Glasses are covered, do the other side. Try to mirror the pattern of gems you made on your first lens to keep symmetry and to keep that “Fly Eye” effect.
When both lenses are covered, allow the glue to set properly for about 10 minutes to allow the fumes to go off and also to reduce the chances of you getting UHU glue in your eyes. I’ve never tried it but I imagine it would sting like a bitch.
Once complete, wear them with pride! You have just made your very on Calvin Harris Fly Eye Glasses! Not bad for about five quid.
Ive gone for pink glasses in this example, but if you want to keep it real go for the plain black option. If you take a look at ebay you can probably find different coloured gemstones to give you a different look.
If you haven’t already done so, go and download Calvin Harris’ album Ready for The Weekend out now!
Here are a couple of dates for your diaries over the next few days as its a bit of an action packed bank holiday weekend.
First of all, get yourself over to Platform Six where you can download the latest episode of my fortnightly radio show. Special guest mix this week from none other than Electro house DJ Piqué !!!! As always, the special guest mix is sandwiched between two very phat choice slices of hand cut funky house mixed by myself. Its a great show that also includes one of the latest tracks from Shola Ama and a bumpin’ cut from Crimes Against Disco!
Now on to the live events… Kicking off with TONIGHT. Yes yes, tonight you can catch myself on the decks up at the always funky, Funky End bar in Aldershot alongside the hairless wonder that is Tom Upton closely followed by the lanky legend Mark Masters. Free entry all night with music pumping out from 9pm until late.
If you haven’t got your fill of fresh upfront Funky House tunes by then, you can continue the party TOMORROW NIGHT over at the HaHa bar in Guildford. Usual suspects of Tom Upton and Mark Masters will be in control of your dancefloor, plus I will be there too to spin a couple of tunes. Once again, it’s free entry all night so to be fair you have no excuses not to turn up. Saturday will be a good one as I plan to have a couple of beers and dance around like a lemon.
Getting to the top in this industry is all about getting yourself heard and by using the technology of the internet this is now even easier than ever before. I thought I would share with you below some of my favourite and most effective free ways of getting yourself heard on the ‘net in a shameless self-promotion roundup of some of the better sites out there. All of these web sites are free to join.
Facebook
Get yourself a Facebook account if you havent already done so. This will open up two worlds to you. You can create yourself your own self promotion Facebook Group and invite people to join, plus you can also set up your own Fan Page to allow members to become your fan. Both these options you can use to send out updates, mixes and information about forthcoming gigs.
If you sign up to be a member at the DJ list, you can get yourself listed into the worlds largest DJ directory for free. It is a place that will host your DJ biography and some pictures, but the real beauty of this site is it allows you to get your fan base voting for you to allow you to climb up the DJ rankings.
Getting your mixes listed in iTunes is not as difficult as you might think. All you need is your mix hosted on a website somewhere and an iTunes account. iTunes is installed on millions of computers and mobile devices around the world and therefore having your mixes listed will help you to reach a global audience. For help and advice on how to do this, check out my post on getting listed in the iTunes directory.
I am not a massive fan of MySpace but I do feel it has its place in this list. After all, it does have millions of members plus it launched the careers of artists such as Lilly Allen and Calvin Harris. MySpace gives you the freedom to create your own personal space on the internet, connect with friends and famous people and do pretty much anything you want. It’s a well recognised platform in the industry and one that should not be ignored.
If you have yourself a Google email address or Google account then you can sign in and use the services of Orkut. Its a bit like Facebook but without the faff. You can find people with simmilar inerests on there, join communities and use the site like an open networking tool to spread the word of yourself and your talents.
Upcoming is a service run by Yahoo that can best be described as a social calendar. When you have a number of DJ bookings that you want to promote and spread the word, you can list up your DJ dates on Upcoming. This will give you an RSS feed of events that your fans can subscribe to and keep up to date with where you are playing and when. You can also find other like minded individuals and “friend & follow” them much you would with other social web sites. A good way to promote your DJ gigs.
This social network is a little bit like a business version of Facebook. You get to keep in touch with loads of business contacts and is really good for networking. If you come across a promoter or a fellow DJ that you think you would like to work with in future you can’t go wrong by adding them to your LinkedIn network profile.
Producing a regular podcast that is available for download is a great way to promote yourself as a DJ. It gives people an example of what they can expect when they come to book you for an event plus you can attract a large following of fans if you podcast on a regular basis. Podomatic takes the headache out of all the technical stuff and gives you a space on the web where you can publish your podcast for free. The paid for version gives you a bit more space but the free version is definitely worth a look.
I grow to love Twitter more and more each day. A lot of people (myself included) failed to see the point of Twitter on their first use. But I feel it is an essential networking weapon that you should have in your self promotion toolbox. You get to find out what people are doing right now in real time and you get to share what you are up to as well. It probably doesn’t sound that impressive right now but if you give it a couple of weeks you will start to understand what it is all about. There are currently thoughts that Twitter is looking to rival Google so this is one online bandwagon you don’t want to miss out on.
Getting yourself an online blog is a great online self promotion tool because of its flexibility. If you have a lot to say for yourself you can keep a blog updated with news, comments, forthcoming gigs and interesting things. If you have nothing to say you can just keep it updated with fresh mixes on a regular basis. A blog gives you the ability to receive feedback on what you do by allowing visitors to comment on the things you do and say plus you will find it opens yourself up to the whole blogging comunity where you can find like-minded people out there who also do what you do - it’s a great networking tool. There are many different blogging tools out there but my favourite is Wordpress. You can get a free Wordpress blog by going to wordpress.com or you can build your own custom blog at wordpress.org
Soonnight
Soonnight is a fairly new online dance community and magazine website dedicated to clubbing. They have loads of great information about events and parties happening around the UK. You can add a profile, pitcures, videos and list events you are/have attending/attended.
Dontstayin (DSI) is simmilar to Soonnight but it has been around for a lot longer. DSI recently had a much needed re-design and now everything on the site is a lot easier to do. Again, you can add pics and videos, acknowledge your attendence to events but you can also start discussion threads and interact a lot more with other clubbers/punters. DSI is a great platform for getting to know the people who actually go to the events rather than the DJs who play there. From my own experience I feel DSI tends to lean towards the hard house/trance side of music but they do cover a wide range of music styles and tastes overall.
Who hasn’t heard of Youtube? Ok, so you all know what it does. Get yourself some footage of yourself DJing and upload it to Youtube for the world to see. Make sure you use music that you have permission to use. If you don’t you might find your video gets pulled down. When you upload a Youtube video you have the opportuniy to add “tags”. Do not overlook this as tags are what lets other users find your video. Make sure you add about ten short descriptive words that are relevant to your video. Choosing the right tags will boost your views and in turn boost your exposure. Youtube also provides code for you to embed the video into your MySpace page or even your Wordpress blog. Also don’t forget you can link easily to your page by sending people to www.youtube.com/[username] for example: www.youtube.com/djpaulvelocity
Muzu
This is a bit of a weird one to describe as Muzu is kind of a mixture of a lot of the other websites mentioned before. Primarily it is used for adding videos much the same way as Youtube. You can add a profile, images and events just like Soonnight and DSI, plus you can modify and manage your profile a bit like MySpace. It describes itself as a new Music TV site where you can watch create and share music video playlists along with behind the scene footage, interviews and documentaries. You can favourite videos you like to create a playlist and in effect create your own personal TV channel of all the stuff you like. But upload a couple of videos of yourself in the mix and get spreading your sound to the masses.
Ok, so this site might be quite genre-specific, but I really love the way this website is put together. Someone has really thought about it as all the controls and buttons are in the right places and stuff just makes sense. This is a website dedicated to the UK Funky House scene where you can drop in your RSS feeds, latest gig dates, event and profile pictures and so on. It’s just a really nice niche self-promotion web site and I really like it - I think the future of online self promotion lies in this niche genre-specific style of website. I expect other genres not only of house but Trance and Drum & Bass to follow suit very soon.
This is just a brief summary of some of the online self promotion DJ tools that I use. If there are any others out there that you use, please add them to the comments below along with a couple of words about how they have helped you.
Shocking Youth is a new clothing label and design house run by two young Londoners who recognise and respect the power of superior design, exclusivity and quality product.
Shocking Youth relate to the people who are fed up with the same old high-street tat, the same appropriated visuals, piss poor designs and slogan t-shirts that say absolutely nothing about the wearer, all lost in the ocular noise of transient fashion. Refusing to opportate in this bloated and repetitive mechnaism Shocking Youth have set up shop to offer a unique perspective on clothing design and production.
Shocking Youth believe in limited small runs of their garments to guarantee the customer exclusivity of the product. Each item is bestowed with an individual catalogue number to record, register and celebrate it’s existence as a limited item.
Designs will usually be restricted to fifty to one hundred prints in any particular colour and once sold out will be logged in the archives and confined to history. Shocking Youth deal in instant artefacts. This is commodity fetishism at its finest.
All purchases are currently limited to Shocking Youth’s own online store at: shockingyouth.com
A new project has just been started up which is encouraging DJs to make music out of the parts of a car.
The project www.30beats.co.uk is a web site created with Krysko, a Manchester based DJ and car manufacturer Hyundai. Krysko has made a track to bring the concept alive and they are challenging DJs and producers to make their own tracks, with the incentive of a winning a car as a prize.
They have supplied numerous samples of noises that the car makes, from horn beeps and wiper blades to seat belts and starter motors. You can download the lot as a package and then manipulate the sounds to create your very own track.
For more information including the rules and how to enter, check out the website over at www.30beats.co.uk
Comedy night with @ohdannyboy1982 tonight. We're off to see John Moloney, Marc Lucero and Steve N Allen with @michaellegge as compere #8 hours ago
Mixes and audio available from this site are intended for home review only. If you like the music, please support the artists and purchase the music legally from the links provided.
RiffSpot focuses on two main audiences; Record labels/Independent artists and top music industry professionals. Both get a fantastic and unique service whatever their needs. Record labels and independent artists can rely on RiffSpot to distribute their forthcoming releases to music industry professionals that have an influence within their music genre. Each professional on the books is vetted to ensure they’re able to provide significant exposure for each release. Also you can supply your own list of music industry contacts to RiffSpot and these contacts will also receive the promo allowing you to track your efforts from one single place. Once professionals have received your promo, they will preview and rate your music prior to downloading it. This means that you gain access to insightful
Following on from my previous post about the 
I’m not ashamed to admit that yes I am a big fan of 
So I thought I would share my tips in creating a new set of glasses for his forthcoming live gig in a few weeks time.
Once complete, wear them with pride! You have just made your very on Calvin Harris Fly Eye Glasses! Not bad for about five quid.
First of all, get yourself over to 
The project 