Tales From The Dancefloor

We've been featuring DJs, producers, artist managers and industry leaders in Tales From The Dancefloor, and in this 45th episode, our last for the first season of our podcast, we wanted to turn the tables and put our very own Phil Morse in the hot seat.You'll find out about how Phil got his start in music and DJing, his days promoting club nights in Manchester and why he moved on from all of it, and how he eventually put up the blog and site you're reading this on. So if you've been following Digital DJ Tips for a while now, or even if you're new to our community, there's lots of great stories here with lots of life and career lessons for your #DJlife. Enjoy this final season ender episode - it's Phil as you've never seen (or heard) him before :) 

Ben Stowe got his love of the geeky side of audio and visual gear from kicking around a TV shop as a kid. But his growing tech-savviness became his saviour when it literally allowed him to work his way out of his life in a homeless shelfer as a young adult.Now running a large company that he founded, which takes care of audio and visuals for some of the biggest DJs, live music shows and sports events in the USA, Ben has never forgotten where he came from. So he spends a lot of his time "paying it forward", teaching DJs how to correctly set up, maintain and use the technology in their rigs, so they sound better and can perform more professionally. In this, the penultimate episode of the first series of Tales From The Dancefloor, Ben shares his story.Ben's company: https://www.nlfxpro.com/

As well as being a wicked DJ, Brandon Block was seen as one of the biggest party animals of the 90s in the UK rave and club scene, living larger than life. Stories of excess were legendary, and an infamous appearance on the Brits (UK music awards) in 2000 reinforced his reputation.TV appearances including one on Celebrity Big Brother kept Brandon's name in the public eye, but in the background he'd had a personal pivot, working hard helping those who'd come off the rails through drug abuse or who were struggling with mental health issues. Nowadays he's still DJing, but also continuing his work as a life coach. In this honest, funny and optimistic episode, Brandon shares his journey...• Learn more about one of Brandon's projects here: https://www.happydaysforeveryone.com/

Tall Paul was one of the biggest UK DJs of the 1990s, made famous originally via his residencies at Turnmills in London. In fact, his Turnmills Friday night "The Gallery" is still running (nowadays at Ministry of Sound). He toured America and the world, has an Ibiza residency, and scored a couple of huge hits, not least Camisra's "Let Me Show You".Changing times, family, burnout and a loss of direction all took their toll on Paul in the 2000s, as his passion for music warped into business commitments, and he stepped back for several years. Recently however, spurred on by the revival of interest in 90s UK clubbing, he has returned to the studio and to gigging regularly. In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, he shares his the story of his ups and downs.Paul's Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/dj1tallpaul/

Like many a young DJ, Dominik Sobanski spend the obligatory ten years enjoying the music scene - promoting, DJing bars, hustling, living the DJ dream (in this case, in Huddersfield, in the north of England). Not many DJs can say they ended up booking Pete Tong and Calvin Harris though!But when it all fell apart, he narrowly avoided setting up a car wash, and instead pivoted into the mainstream entertainment agency space - where now, he has a company employing hundreds of DJs who play in bars and clubs the length and breadth of the UK, and as far afield as Ibiza and Croatia. In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, he shares how he did it.• Find out more about Dominik at the WDC Entertainment website and the WDC & Friends podcast.

As one half of the "LuvDup Twins", Mark van den Berg - originally from Cape Town, South Africa - made a name for himself in the Manchester (or "Madchester") scene in the 1990s as a DJ, producer, and club promoter - culminating in DJs in places as far flung as Russia and Hong Kong. Later he found himself pivoting into working on an early social media platform, before getting into the video DJ business, supplying music videos to DJs across Europe.While he still does that (nowadays with his own company, WeMix), he also found time to become a wedding DJ, forming one of the most successful DJ companies in the south of England, Mighty Fine Entertainment. It's not only a company that has won awards, but that has led to him being a wedding industry award judge himself. In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, Mark shares his ups and downs, and some great stories too!• Find out more about Mark over at Facebook Page.

For those who know, John 00 Fleming is one of the flag bearers for a certain kind of underground music that was once called "trance", but that in the past 20 years has had to relabel and regroup against the EDM onslaught. In great demand and touring the world still after 30 years of professional DJng, John also has a remarkable personal history of battles, including battling and beating lung cancer at just 19 years old.In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, John shares the ups and downs of a decades-long career, and talks in depth about what has to happen to the music he loves for it to live on, dropping the names and labels he thinks will fly the flag for trance into the next decades.• Find out more about John over at his site: http://www.john00fleming.com/.

Ean Golden is a name closely associated with the rise of digital DJing and controllerism, mainly through his championing the scene in San Francisco at the turn of the century, his input onto the design of some early iconic DJ hardware, and of course through being the founder and figurehead of DJ TechTools.In this honest and contemplative edition of Tales From The Dancefloor, Ean shares stories of his early life as a DJ, how he's ridden some of the highs and lows of a unique career, and how a near breakdown in Ibiza led to a period of soul-searching... and a new direction. Now living in New York, Ean explains why recently, he's decided to return to the spotlight at DJ TechTools, and what he plans to do next.

For many in the know, Innofader is held as an example of all that's right about boutique companies in the DJ industry. It's a company that exists solely to make crossfaders, either so DJs can replace those that came with their DJ mixers for better performance, or for forward-looking manufacturers to fit top their gear "out of the box".And those who really know will know that Patrick Danaher has been an integral part of the success of that company. His story is one of following your dreams, making hard decisions, and having the conviction to run with what you know is right - and he shares it this week on Tales from the Dancefloor.• Find out more about Patrick at his personal site and his Facebook page, and check out the Innofader site.

Grahame Farmer is behind the Data Transmission website, which at its height employed 19 people and has spawned an online radio show and record label. While the site is still going strong, in the last couple of years Grahame has had a personal "pivot" into something quite different: DJ success coaching.In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, he shares where the idea came from, how he built an audience for DJ coaching, and how he managed to coach 60 DJs a month spread all around the world. He also shares some tips for getting yourself noticed as a DJ, so listen in if you're trying to get your tracks or mixes to a wider audience...• Find out more about Grahame at the Data Transmission website: https://datatransmission.co

Seb Fontaine was EVERYWHERE in the 1990s - he had a Radio 1 show, he had a long-standing Cream residency, he mixed compilations for Ministry of Sound, Perfecto and Global Underground... he was one of the first wave of superstar DJs.But unlike many of his peers, he's still going strong - gigging, making music, and loving it more than ever. Here he shares the highs and lows, and reveals his thoughts on the right way to DJ, underground vs overground, and much more!Follow Seb: Seb's InstagramMore about Mixbox: Evermix website 

Morgan Page is one of the hardest working DJ/producers in the scene, playing festivals the world over, providing music for Tesla and Space X, collecting Grammy nominations... but it all started for him not in clubs, but as a radio DJ - something he still does to this day with his Sirius XM show and podcast.In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, Morgan shares some of the secrets of his success, including why going slow is usually the best bet, how to chase success while staying true to yourself, and how collaboration and teaching have helped him to stay fresh and focused.• To find out more about Morgan Page, check out his site and mixshow.

Imagine what it's like curating the music for, and DJing at, Formula E race meetings around the world each and every season, and having your DJ sets not only playing at the racetracks, but beamed into the homes of 200 million people worldwide?EJ (don't call him "DJ EJ"!) is a London-born DJ/producer who helped to create this job, and who does it year in year out. In this edition of Tales From The Dancefloor, he shares how he got the opportunity, what it's like, how he balances the job with his commitments to his young family... and how his future may well lie in not only electric cars, but saving the world with hemp...• More about EJ on his Facebook Page.

Aston Harvey was there right at the beginning of the explosion of DIY dance music in London in the late 80s - but little did he know when he formed his group The Freestylers with his friend Matt 10 years later, that they'd have a 20-year career championing the breakbeat sound worldwide.How did they do it? What's the secret of spending three decades in dance music? And what did it feel like going from watching Top of the Pops (famous UK pop music TV show) as a kid, to actually being on it as an adult? In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, Aston answers these questions and shares his stories.

German producer and DJ Luca Schreiner is an up and coming name to watch. Still only 24, he's self-taught, with a keen eye for what works both on the radio and the dancefloor. From his breakout cover version of Everything But The Girl's "Missing" (that got him signed to Ultra Music), to his remixes of James Arthur, Kelly Clarkson, Clean Bandit, even Backstreet Boys, to his big-stage festival DJ sets - he's making inroads in all the right areas. In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, Luca talks about what it was like having a dad already in this industry, what his school friends thought of him getting into music production, how he made the leap from remixing other people to writing his own songs, how the internet has helped artists to collaborate globally... and how it felt to DJ at New York's iconic Marquee club. More on Luca at his website: http://lucaschreiner.com/

Received wisdom has it that a bunch of British DJs went to Ibiza in the late 80s and brought house music to the UK via London - something Manchester has always contested! In this episode, been-there-done-that Manchester radio and club DJ David Dunne talks about those amazing years from the perspective of the North of England. And he should know - he presented the first ever house music radio show in the north-west of England, he had a weekday daytime show on Kiss 102 (Manchester's first dedicated dance station) and went on to DJ worldwide for Hed Kandi, as well as becoming director of music at MTV. But there's a twist in this tale - and it's a poignant and memorable one... • More about David Dunne on his SoundCloud.

From his worldwide touring schedule, to his long-running record label Punx, to his work with names like Deadmau5 and Oliver Heldens, MOGUAI is not only a prolific DJ and producer, but also a true industry veteran, having started his career playing techno in his native Germany way back in the early 90s. In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, MOGUAI talks about the changes in his music, what it was like to play to 750,000 people at Berlin's Love Parade, how his collaboration with deadmau5's label catapulted him into a global festival career - and why he can never see himself retiring from making electronic music. More about MOGUAI: Website

Growing up in a hippy collective, the young Jonas Norberg was always around music - but it was when he sold his bass guitar and bought decks and records that his path as a DJ was set. However, it is Jonas's work with Pacemaker DJ hardware and software that has shaped his adult life. Pacemaker originally made an innovative portable, handheld DJ device. But that led to the current incarnation of the company, as a developer of innovative AI-driven DJ apps that are helping music lovers to become DJs. Pacemaker was one of the first (and is still one of the only) DJ apps to offer Spotify streaming, and the company's "Metamix" technology is helping DJs to collaborate on and share their mixes legally. Here, Jonas shares his story, including a "will it/won't it work?" Steve Jobs-esque technology keynote moment, and a great Eric Prydz & Swedish House Mafia tale. • More about Pacemaker at the Pacemaker website

When Stephanie Dell's teenage boyfriend left his job in the parts department of Denon, she thought "I'll apply for that!" - and immediately found herself neck-deep helping DJs with their purchases of Denon's very first DJ CD decks. Just a few years later, she'd combined her love of technology, her passion for music, and her new-found marketing ability to launch Sound Marketing, a PR agency that she has grown to become a leader in its field. In this issue of Tales From The Dancefloor, Steph talks about her musical family, raving in the 90s, what it's like being a girl in a predominantly male industry, the role technology plays in music... and shares stories about things like the very last night of Space, Ibiza, and hanging with James Zabiela in the VIP camping at Glastonbury Festival... Steph's company: Sound Marketing PR

Alex Zinn (aka SpinnZinn) is a techno DJ and producer who recently played a homecoming gig at Ultra, and in front of 60,000 people at Madrid's A Summer Story festival. In his day job, he's involved in the marketing of both Richie Hawtin's Model 1 mixer and Allen & Heath's Xone:96, spending much of his time touring the world with one or both in tow, demoing them to clubs and DJs, and livestreaming his progress as he does! In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, Alex talks about his early days DJing in Miami, how he got involved with Richie, how he talked his way into the Allen & Heath job by basically inventing it on the spot... and how he developed his "freeform" unique DJing style. Alex's Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/SpinnZinn/

Sam Gribben was one of the first four people to work at Serato... and when he left the company 10 years later, he'd been CEO for over half a decade, and the workforce was 75! Not bad for someone at their first serious job... Since then, Sam has combined his skills in technology, his love for music, and a life-long attraction to teaching, in his new company, Melodics. Melodics is an innovative take on online music tuition, teaching keyboards, drums and how to use controller pads. In this episode of Tales From the Dancefloor, Sam talks about the pirate TV station he helped start while still at college, his failed attempt to get involved with an early innovator of DVS technology at 4am at a party in Amsterdam... and how RZA of Wu Tang Klan gave the Serato team the shock of their lives in the early days! More about melodics: https://melodics.com "That" RZA interview: https://youtu.be/TXsYXMqw4Zc

Rik Parkinson, like so many, basically got into the music industry from being a fan and a DJ. Little could he have guessed at the start of his career as a junior at Pioneer DJ that he’d end up researching features DJs want and helping Pioneer DJ’s design team to bring them to market, through his current role in product development. A textbook behind-the-scenes mover and shaker (and actually, that rarest of things nowadays – a “company man”: Rik’s been at Pioneer for his whole career so far), you may nevertheless have seen Rik on the Digital DJ Tips YouTube channel over the years, talking about new gear from Pioneer DJ in show report videos. But in this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, he shares his whole story, and reveals what it’s like helping to design the gear many of us rely on in our DJing lives.

Burma-born, UK-raised, DJ Angelo is one of the world’s most respected and versatile DJs, with a style that blends a scratch DJ's technical skill with a club DJ's ability to rock a dancefloor all night long. The past few years have seen Angelo perform across every continent of the world, as well as finding new audiences through his work as a content creator and product consultant for DJ equipment brand Reloop, among others. In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, Angelo discusses his upbringing, where he gets his drive and determination from, what it's like playing some of the more unusual gigs he's played... and how his career had more than a few twists and turns before DJing became his "thing". Angelo's website: https://djangelo.co.uk/

When her brother dramatically fell ill hours before a wedding he was booked to DJ at, Rachel Lynch decided that the show had to go on: Despite zero DJing experience, she stepped in and performed the gig. Now, 15 years on, she's one of the best-known and most-loved event DJs in the USA. In this fun episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, Rachel talks to us about how it felt stepping up at that first gig, how she got established, how she prepared for DJing a warm-up set for George Clinton, her love of cars and car shows... and how getting a gig at the local gym was one of the best career moves she ever made. She also shares the ups and downs of being a female in the DJ world, and explains how she got into online educating - something that has helped her to gain acceptance and gratitude across the event DJ community from that traumatic start all those years ago! Rachel's Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/djrachel.lynch

Robb McDaniels always knew he wasn't going to spend the rest of his life working in merchant banking, where he started his career. He knew the pull of the dance music scene that he loved so much was going to get him in the end. Yet when he started his first company, to bring the UK dance music he loved to the USA digitally (this was pre iTunes...), he couldn't even name all the major record labels... Roll forward a few years, and that company - INgrooves - was handling digital distribution for over four million tracks in the States, and counted one of those labels, the Universal Music Group, as a client. Robb was in demand as a music industry investor, while his entrepreneurial streak led him to start a management services company, which ended up working with names like Thievery Corporation and Paul Oakenfold. Nowadays he heads up electronic download store Beatport, and is spearheading that company's drive into streaming with Beatport LINK, as well as expanding its reach to the more mainstream pop, Latin and hip-hop music scenes via its collaboration with DJCity: Beatsource. In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, Robb looks back over his rise, shares some great stories from the music industry, and gives his thoughts on what comes next in dance culture.

DJ TLM will be best known to fans of Tales From The Dancefloor as the man behind scores of supremely helpful YouTube DJing tutorials, and his #sharetheknowledge podcast series. But from his earliest days promoting events in his own house, DJ TLM has been a performer - and in this awesome episode, he reveals his life as a club, tour, mix and radio DJ, including how a chance encounter with a rising Dutch hip-hip star has led to over 3,500 DJ gigs in a decades-long collaboration. He also talks frankly about work/life balance, DJing and having kids, and dealing with racism in his early clubbing days. Meet one of the names who has made it easier for YOU to learn DJing online. More: DJ TLM's website

Tapping into an unusual reserve of “get up and go”, a young Simon Walsh did just that. His jet-setting start to his music career involved things like, y’know, hearing Larry Levan play and visiting Studio 54 in New York… Quickly fascinated by the science of promoting new releases, Simon went on to found what is now the biggest independent music promotion company in the UK, Music House, working on both the biggest commercial releases and more underground sounds. He’s still doing it today, decades on. In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, Simon shares many stories, including tales of being a radio plugger, and driving a very young Take That around the UK from gig to gig…

Scotty Hoogerbrug always loved dance music and owned decks - but it wasn't until he was offered the top marketing job at Serato as its CMO that his love for building businesses, coding and technology, and the DJ world all came together. And while nowadays he travels the world, gets backstage at the best gigs, even gets invited every year to Jazzy Jeff's exclusive DJ retreat, Scott is essentially still a fan - and a fan who sometimes has to pinch himself to remember that this is all happening for real! In this cool episode of "Tales From The Dancefloor", Scotty shares his story, revealing what it's like being in Serato's top team, and the journey that led him there.

Talk to any DJ who's been around long enough about Laidback Luke and you hear a similar story: He's incredibly passionate about the art of DJing, and he makes time for everyone. We'd like to add that he's also a survivor, having had a whole techno career before he reinvented himself as a more mainstream DJ/producer. But there's so much more to him than even that: He's mastered social media and vlogging; he has nurtured talent right from the very beginning, running an influential production forum that saw the likes of Steve Angello and Avicii using it to help them cut their teeth as producers; and of course, famously, he practises kung fu (and even trains people via his own online kung fu school). In this honest and revealing podcast, Luke shares tales of his early life before and in music, the struggles he's had balancing being a husband and a dad with a global DJ career- and some hilarious stories of his early days as he rose to worldwide fame.

From his first love of UK "hardcore" (the "old school rave" scene, not the guitar "hardcore"), Jay Cunning has been involved neck-deep in all things breakbeat in the UK. the breakbeat scene was a phenomenon in itself, and to those who didn't witness it first-hand, Jay's stories will in themselves be fascinating. But this podcast is more than that: Jay talks about how scenes rise and fall, and why; he shares stories of life in radio, both legal and decidedly illegal; and talks about DJing when you've got a full-time job. We cover making DJing work with a partner and family, clubs vs radio, running a DJ school, and many other things Jay's done and learned in his long career. It's all in another absorbing episode of Tales from the Dancefloor. Jay's links: Website - http://wearehardcore.uk/ Podcast: http://smarturl.it/JCpodcast     Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/JayCunningDJ Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jaycunningdj/

Olga Heijns drifted into the music industry just by virtue of going out and getting to know people, at a time when there was no real career path in dance music. Yet even before her current role (which includes managing Laidback Luke), she held positions at Sony Music, SoSoDef and Mushroom Records, forging a unique path for herself. For the past 17 year, she's been super-successful as the founder and CEO of Mixmash Records, Syndicate The Agency, and Unmanageable Artists. Her career has taken her halfway around the word (she did a stint in Australia), and through many highs and lows, including a public business falling out with Roger Sanchez. She talks frankly about all of this in this revealing and valuable episode of Tales from the Dancefloor.

Paul Dakeyne has been in this business for a third of a century. Cutting his teeth as a DJ and remixer way before Acid House and the Summer Of Love took the UK by storm at the end of the 80s, he went on to score one of the biggest dance hits of the 90s, Tinman's "18 Strings", that just so happened to have been based around Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" guitar riff. In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, Paul talks about his early days having left home to move to London as a remixer, how "that" tune changed his life, and his life since as a podcaster, photographer, DJ tech ambassador, educator... and now full circle back to producing. Link to the Tinman track on YouTube: https://youtu.be/fPl9xjlYtMk Link to Paul's Yu2opia project on SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/user-270249528

Judge Jules is often mentioned in the same breath as Carl Cox, Paul Oakenfold, Pete Tong and many other "first wave" UK DJs. But as well as having had a decades-long career as a DJ and producer, Jules has also always had his eye on a second career - as a music industry lawyer. In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, Jules talks about his early days as an illegal rave promoter and pirate radio DJ, some of the many OTHER roles he's had in the industry (yes, there have been more...), and how he manages to square doing basically two full-time jobs with family life. He also tells us how his current "Judge Jules Live" project is going - touring with a ten-piece band and playing club music live in venues up and down the country.

Dan Bewick was one half of prolific dance production outfit Dirty Rotten Scoundrels - but before that, he was an illegal rave promoter and DJ in London. Since them, he's gone on to have a successful career scoring films and TV adverts, based out of LA. Dan's journey has seen him touring the world playing some of the biggest gigs imaginable - but also holding residencies where he honed the DJ craft, enduring the hardships of trying to move permanently from London to LA - and coming into work one Monday morning to face seven lawsuits for a bootleg he'd put out that was blowing up BIG across the dance world. In this wide-ranging and at times hilarious episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, Dan shares how he's coped with all the ups and downs, how he completely lost the plot in a field in the 90s (which shaped what was to come)... and what it felt like to arrive at work to face all those lawsuits!

Jason Jani is one of America's top wedding and event DJs. He's DJed at celebrity parties galore, including the Superbowl afterparty. When Wedding Wire (the international wedding services directory that has 8,500 DJs on its books) wants a DJ for its own events, Jason is who they book. Through a mixture of club-standard music and mixing, high quality production, social media savvy, and sheer force of personality, Jason has almost singlehandedly dragged the "mobile DJ" stateside into the 21st century. But for Jason, it wasn't always like this. His journey has taken him through many highs but also several notable lows. In this episode of "Tales From The Dancefloor", he speaks frankly about getting himself through college, the heartbreak of an injury that cut short a promising sporting career... and risking it all on setting up his event DJ company, the SCE Event Group. It's a must-hear for ambitious wedding and event DJs - not least because he explains his approach to social media, and especially Instagram - something that he admits has been a huge driving force for his business.

Ferry Corsten is a trance superstar. In the late 90s and early 2000s he produced worldwide hits as System F, Moonman, Pulp Victim and Gouryella, working with Armin van Buuren, Tïesto and many other big names from the Dutch DJ scene. For many people his "Trance Nation" mix albums for Ministry of Sound were a huge touchpoint, but nowadays he plays a broader electronic music style - everything from progressive house to uplifting trance. As well as hosting his own weekly radio show, Corsten's Countdown, he regularly plays at events and festivals all over the world including Electric Daisy Carnival, Tomorrowland and many others, and has been consistently ranked in DJ Mag's Top 100 DJs poll. Meanwhile Unity project, in which he's collaborated with Paul Oakenfold among others, is a campaign to try to unite the disparate thread of the trance scene. In this episode, Ferry talks frankly about his decades as a trance DJ and producer, the state of music today, and where he sees it going. He also talks about juggling touring with having a family... and reveals an exciting new direction to his life away from DJing. Ferry's website: https://www.ferrycorsten.com/

When DJ Dan started promoting indie club nights at university, he was doing everything himself (including the DJing), and working as hard as he could to fill one 200-person venue. Now, 17 years later, he sees 25,000 people through the doors of his club nights every weekend in the UK... and he still loves to DJ at his own events. Nowadays, Dan's organisation, Propaganda, runs events in 17 cities, and has thrown parties all over the world. His work has led him to DJing for Oasis, and he has a Glastonbury residency to boot. And all from someone who took a long time to really feel he was a "proper" DJ at all! Learn what it's like to be a DJ/promoter who focuses on guitar music rather than dance, how it feels to DJ at an event where members of many of the bands whose records you usually spin are actually on the dancefloor themselves, and what it's like to be in charge of large-scale club nights running simultaneously in cities all over the UK... while still DJing at one of them yourself! Check out Dan's events at the Propaganda website: https://www.thepropaganda.com/

When he left university, Lohan Presencer didn't want to join the world of work. He didn't really want to grow up and leave the student life at all. So he applied for a job in the very university he'd been studying at, as their entertainment booker. So started an incredible and unlikely journey that took Lohan through promoting raves on the south coast of England, to plugging (often decidedly average) music in his first job in the record industry... to his current position heading up Ministry of Sound, one of the most famous club brand in the world. In this wide-ranging conversation, Lohan shares some of his biggest successes, talks about the difference between good DJs and bad ones... and explains why he's now so excited to share with the next generation of music entrepreneurs some of the lessons he learned on his own way to the top.

Just how do you go from teaching yourself to make mixtapes with a cassette player, to being a two-times DMC UK Supremacy Champion, five-times IDA UK Champion, and Red Bull 3style UK finalist... as well as becoming a world-touring DJ, scratch tutor and competition judge? Well, in DJ Rasp's case, he did it via a long-term stint as the DJ in a band, and working with a world-famous orchestra! Still DJing several times a week to this day, nowadays Rasp also teaches, not least for us here at Digital DJ Tips, where he produces Skill Session videos and helps out inside our scratch training courses. This conversation gives some deep insight into the scratch world, Rasp shares what it was like to tour China recently... and he reminisces about when mixtapes actually were, you know, tapes... You can find Rasp online at: https://www.facebook.com/deejayrasp/ https://www.instagram.com/djrasp/

Ever wondered what it's like being a world-renowned mashup artist? US-based DJ Adam Dutch knows, having had huge success with a succession of mashups, that tend to be (but aren't always!) in his beloved style, basically where rock and hip hop meet. I was intrigued as to how he got into it, and what his motivations are - and it turned out that he's much more than just a "mashup guy". A Berklee Music Business MBA graduate, he's established himself as a producer, as a radio DJ, as a podcaster and wedding DJ - and over and above all that, as a working DJing, playing 150+ shows a year to crowds up to 30,000. It's a fascinating and motivating conversation, with a lot about entrepreneurship in it. You can find Adam online at: http://adamdutch.com https://facebook.com/djadamdutch https://instagram.com/djadamdutch https://mixcloud.com/djadamdutch

From his early DJing escapades at school in Munich, Germany, Karim Morsy - the head of DJ software company Algoriddim - has come a long way. He and his team built their company - home of the Apple-centric "djay" apps - into one of the most respected DJ software developers out there. But nothing could have prepared him for what happened next... Despite not really understanding what Karim did for a living and wondering when he'd get a "real job", even Karim's parents finally had to admit that there might be something in what their son had chosen to do for a living... when he wandered out onto the stage on a globally televised Apple Keynote and began DJing on his iPad! What did that feel like? Did he practise? Was he actually DJing up there, or playing safe and miming? And how, exactly, did he and his teenage friends start and grow a software company, on their own, that got to be one of the most loved platforms out there, especially for Apple users? Karim reveals all of this, and more, about his fascinating life, in this episode of Tales from the Dancefloor.

After an obligatory ten years as a straight-up DJ, Mojaxx spent the next four years carving a space for himself online as one of the most respected reviewers of DJ technology. And yet to unwind, he likes nothing better than to ditch it all and spin his beloved 7" singles, on good old turntables. So... what's the fascination with playing vinyl when you're a tech reviewer... especially 7" vinyl? How did he fall into reviewing DJ gear for a job? What's it like travelling the world as a member of the influential DJcity crew? Oh, and what's with the mohican haircut? Mojaxx spills the beans in this fun and revealing episode. Mojaxx's website: http://mojaxx.com/ Tale from the Dancefloor home page: https://www.digitaldjtips.com/podcast

Like so many of us, Dan's DJing started at school. (In his case, though, it was an impossibly cool-sounding boarding school that not only favoured "normal kids" over the toffs, but admitted both sexes too!) However, unlike many, Dan's DJing took him around the world. Ever wondered what it might be like to play Ministry of Sound in Singapore? Dan could tell you... But as ever, that over-simplifies the story. Because along the way, Dan almost accidentally fell into video DJing, and found himself in both Mixmag and DJ magazines' charts as one of the world's top VJs. And while he's now settled in his current role fronting Pioneer DJ's radio output, he has lots of stories from those who he interviews and works with who are still at the "DJ" phase... and gives some fresh insights into the sacrifices the top DJs make to live in that world. Tale from the Dancefloor home page: https://www.digitaldjtips.com/podcast

When he couldn't afford to hire a studio to record his band in, Joey Santos decided to start his own. Little did he know he'd go from learning how to record music on his PC, to running one of the most successful recording studios in his home city of Manila. He helped scores of bands get their music out to the world, and worked on soundtracks and TV music too. But that was only half of the story. In this episode of Tales From The Dancefloor, Joey shares how the studio life turned out very differently to how he had imagined, how he hit rock bottom with his creativity AND with his landlord, and how his climb back up led him to writing, video making, training people to make music... and falling back in love with making it himself. Tale from the Dancefloor home page: https://www.digitaldjtips.com/podcast

When, as a child in a no-name town, Steve Canueto heard a crackly broadcast of a scratch DJ from London on the radio, he knew there and then he had to get to the big city and be part of the music he'd just discovered. His journey took him far and wide as a DJ, and his passion and drive eventually led to him making a series of CDs that sold millions. But that was only half of the story. In this, the first Tales From The Dancefloor, Steve reveals what drove him into a life in the music industry, why he ultimately had to get out of it... and what saved him, to bring him to where he is today, teaching scratch DJing to thousands of students at the Digital DJ Tips DJ school. Tale from the Dancefloor home page: https://www.digitaldjtips.com/podcast