DJ HEAVYGRINDER

Breaking barriers in the music industry

BY: ASHLEY ZLOTOPOLSKY

When i spoke with HeavyGrinder little did i expect the first statement out of her mouth to be, "Umm, i just crashed my car...and im on the way to Enterprise right now." 

Her giggling is contageous, (litterally she wont stop), and i couldnt help but laugh myself. I wanted to say, "What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas" -but Bobbie (her real name) wouldnt be there until the following day, so it wouldnt have applied. She was heading there that weekend for the Electric Daisy Carnival, where she would be spinning 3-4pm at the Hard Rock Hotel Pool party, hosted by EDM Magazine. This is a pretty big deal in a DJ's career.

"Im probably going to lose my voice at EDC too", she says..upon hearing howing raspy my own voice was following the aftermath of the Movement Electronic Music Festival. We came to the consensus its just an unavoidable by-product of music festivals. "But hey, it happens, and its usually worth it". Its a sign youve had a good time, and it definetely doesnt stop Bobbie from wanting to travel more. Theres one stop she is looking forward to most. Take a guess-if you didnt say DETROIT! shame on you....

"Although im always looking forward to every show and im always excited, Im really looking forward to playing BLEU", she says with another giggle. (The giggling was just so adorable, i couldnt help but smile through the majority of the interview). As her debut in Detroit proper, this will be her first experience spinning in the home of Techno, and shes super stoked.

Besides being exciting to play our city, Bobbie has been keeping busy working on her own music. She has two releases coming out this summer. One is called SWAY for bugeyed records, which includes artists such as ZEDD and Lucky Date, and if you havent checked out this label, its worth a listen. The other is a compilation for Dim Mak records, founded by Steve Aoki- who happens to have a special meaning in Bobbies life. "He's my friend and my top influence," she says, "and i really look up to him and what he is doing."

When Bobbie first began her Music career her main influence was Derrick Carter. And before Derrick Carter, before her days of deejaying, before she even hit middle school-she had already realized her passion for EDM. Her draw to the genre actually began in early childhood. 

"When i first heard 'Children' by Robert Miles-i think it was in elementary school-yeah it was in elementary school-"wow! I just fell in love with the music", she says, emphatically. "Then i got into deejaying my sophomore year of high school. My friends little brother deejayed, and he got me started, and ive just never stopped." and she truly never stopped, getting further into the music and traveling the world throughout her teens. She began by spinning Drum & Bass & Hard House in 2001. Yes, Hard House may have fizzled out over the years but Drum & Bass hasnt.

"I love Drum & Bass, Im listening to it in the car right now!" But im a huge metal-head, and i even like country, she laughs. (i secretly throw up the metal horns at this moment as im the same way.) In fact, her DJ name, HEAVYGRINDER, is an homage to her favorite death metal band, Cannibal Corpse. 

The rest of her story isnt a fairy-tale climb to success , though. Darker moments filled much of the time that elapsed from her beginning moments to her current status. As a female DJ trying to emerge in a scene dominated by men, she encountered alot of difficulties. There was alot of critisism, alot of hating, and alot of nights spent at home crying.

At the time there were very few successful female deejays and it was tough to break through the barrier. Although she describes it as much easier for female deejays nowadays. Things werent so glamorous in the past. But Bobbie didnt let any of this set her back, she pushed for with her love for the music and never gave up. 

"It ws difficult until probably 2007. There was so much female DJ bashing, but thanks to my fans i stayed motivated. My fans kept me around, if it wasnt for them, i dont know what would have happenned." she says. A strong believer in the notion that music is a universal language, her music is always dedicated to those who backed her up. Bobbies fans mean everything to her and are the reason behind everything she does.

Her advice to aspiring female deejays is simple. "Stick with the love for the music, dont let the haters get to you" she says. "People will ALWAYS hate on you when your doing something right!". I couldnt have said it better myself. We all know sayings like "Haters gonna Hate" and "Haters maks us Famous", Bobbie is a true life example of someone who used that hate as fuel and rose above to be the strong, talented and successful artist she is today. Were happy she never gave up because her style and attitude are one of a kind. RDW

Morgan Page’s Jet-Setting Journey Leads Him to Bleu Detroit

When the top three jobs in your home state are manufacturing, construction and health care, your career seems predetermined. But when your home state is Vermont, it's damn near guaranteed. For Morgan Page, those things just wouldn't do. And how does one escape from a predestined fate when music runs through your veins? Simply experiment. Now, Page is a world famous DJ/producer/remixer who has been nominated for two Grammys and three International Dance Music awards. These days, he's kind of a big deal. But while extensively traveling the globe, Page was able to answers some questions before he arrives to play Bleu Detroit's 10-year anniversary weekend.

People might not look at Vermont as a hub of EDM. What was the musical climate like growing up there?

I always jokingly tell people Vermont is the "dance music Mecca." Basically, if you listened to electronic music you were considered a tweaker. Hip-hop, classic rock and jam bands dominated the airwaves and minds of everyone growing up in Vermont. I liked hip-hop before house, then I got the bug for electronic music and everything changed. I think we are seeing a big shift in how people discover and enjoy music these days. People are listening to what they want, not just because it's cool and everyone else is doing it.

There's been a huge shift in EDM going from either underground or mainstream by electronic standards to blowing up on the radio and even being put on MTV. What do you attribute this shift to?

There are several distinct factors causing this – but mainly, it was way overdue. Hip-hop had its time, and now the next natural progression is electronic. Everything works in cycles, and the public needed something fresh and also uplifting during the recession. Look at guys like Avicii – beyond being an amazing producer and great guy in general, his music lifts your spirits. The other major factor is new media's role. People can discover music more quickly without a major label steering their choices. There are so many outlets that the majors cannot dominate them all. With MTV, it was easy for them – and essentially a money game. Outspend your competitor and you win. Now everyone is empowered, but you have to cut through the clutter – which is harder than ever.

A lot of electronic artists produce songs with just beats. Why do you oftentimes add the vocal element?

It doesn't feel like a song to me without a vocal or primary lead element. Even when it's just a lead synth – that's a voicing. So all my songs have lead elements, and almost every song I play does as well.

How is the album coming along?

It's done! Just waiting for it to come out! It's gonna be a crazy release. I gathered some great vocalists and songwriters: Tegan & Sara, Nadia Ali, Greg Laswell, Angela McCluskey. It's diverse and densely packed with vocal heavy songs.

People don't realize how much mainstream pop artists use samples from EDM artists and just take them as that artist's original work. Do you ever feel like the unsung hero?

I've always felt like the unsung hero, and it keeps me humble. I think it's important for electronic artists to get their proper credit. I have a lot of respect for Avicii and sticking to his guns with both the Leona Lewis and Flo–Rida incidents. We are not pop music's bitch. You shouldn't need a Pitbull verse to get on the radio, and your name shouldn't be buried in the credits.

I see you're a fan of Twitter. Has this made interacting with fans easier, and do you ever catch yourself over–sharing? (By the way, how was your hearing test?)

Is that a hint?! (laughs) – I don't know when it's too much. The interaction is fun. It stings when people give you bad feedback, but it toughens you up. Twitter has been a great tool for learning what my fans really feel, and also what strangers are saying! | RDW

Morgan Page w/ Matt Aubrey and Holevar • 12/2, 10 p.m. • Bleu Nightclub Detroit • 1540 Woodward Ave., Detroit • 313.974.7799 • bleudetroit.com tickets: clubtix.com

Dash Berlin is a progressive-trance project created in 2007 in The Hague, Netherlands by Eelke Kalberg and Sebastiaan Molijn. The front man of the group is the DJ Jeffrey Sutorius. Kalberg and Molijn have been contributing to the international dance scene for over ten years, with award-winning and platinum-selling hits for dance acts such as Alice Deejay, Vengaboys, Candee Jay, Pronti & Kalmani and Solid Sessions. They also have been working together with DJ Sander Kleinenberg on classic tracks like “This Is Miami” and “The Fruit” and remixes for major artists such as Justin Timberlake, Janet Jackson, BT, Usher, N.E.R.D., Lenny Kravitz, Junkie XL, Röyksopp, Mylo, and Annie Lennox.

Jeffrey Sutorius was born in November 1979 in The Hague, Netherlands. While in high school he became a fan of electronic music and in his late teens worked in a record store and became a collector of vinyl trance music. Inspired by pioneering figures such as Sven Vath, Oliver Lieb and Sander Kleinenberg, Sutorius began mixing and producing his own music. He started performing in the Dutch underground music scene in early 2006 and within a year teamed up with fellow producers and close friends Kalberg and Molijn to form Dash Berlin.

The breakthrough for the Dash Berlin project came in 2007 with their track “Till the Sky Falls Down”. The track shot straight to the top of the trance charts worldwide due in part to Armin van Buuren who included it on his acclaimed “Universal Religion” album. Van Buuren subsequently signed the group to the Armada Music label.

In early 2009 plans emerged to expand the Dash Berlin influence with its own label called “Aropa.” The first release under this new label was the anthem “Man on the Run”, a collaboration with fellow Armada artists Cerf, Mitiska, & Jaren. The track rocketed to the top of the international Trance charts and received a prestigious nomination for ‘Best Trance Track’ at the annual Trance Awards.

October 2009 brought the global release of Dash Berlin’s critically acclaimed debut album, “The New Daylight”, which contained the hits, “Till the Sky Falls Down”, “Man on the Run”, “Waiting” and “Never Cry Again”. A world tour followed beginning in January 2010 in Australia.

In March 2010 Dash Berlin released their first official mix album entitled, “United Destination”.

DASH BERLIN rocked the club this past Friday night, playing to a packed house with their hands in the air beginning to end.

Life is a Vacation 

Serge Devant

is Living the Dream

BAD BOY BILL

Burning down the House

Everything evolves. That which doesn’t, eventually fades away. For international DJ extraordinaire Bad Boy Bill, the evolutionary process has brought him to the highest echelons of house music, as his progressive musical mindset has taken him from the beat juggling, scratch-tastic DJ battles of his youth to moving crowds of thousands in dance clubs and festivals across the world with his famed scratch-heavy house sets. The globetrotting Chicago-based DJ has a strong affinity for Detroit and will be rolling into town this weekend to beat the speakers up at Bleu. RDW caught up with Bill to talk about his love for The Windy City, Movement ’07, being single and his infamous YouTube clip. Dig in.

You’ve been all over the world, but still call Chicago home. Why do you think that is?
I was born and raised here. I was living in L.A. for a couple winters, checking it out, and was even thinking about buying a place out there, but then I realized that you can’t beat the people in Chicago and the food’s great, too. The weather can, at times, be the worst thing, but in the summer it’s the absolute greatest place. Plus, my whole crew’s here and my studio so I get a lot more work done. In L.A. ... [laugh] I dunno — I think I just end up hanging out at the beach too much.

I don’t think anyone could blame you for that, man. Where do you hang out in Chicago?
Well, I got a gig coming up at Vision, which is a really cool spot. Ya know, there’s just so many places in Chicago and that’s the cool thing, there’s a lot of really good new clubs opening up and just a lot happening — Lollapalooza was just here and that was awesome.

With new clubs opening up, what's the house scene looking like these days in Chicago?
Well, for a while, I think Chicago had flipped deep into hip-hop and the whole mash-up thing, but if you go to most clubs in Chicago now you’ll see that it’s back, or going back, to house music, which is a good thing because it was born here and so it’s good to hear house getting the predominant play in the clubs.

You definitely have roots in hip-hop and turntablism — do you still get into that?
I still get into it a little bit, but not as much as I did. I’m definitely into the art of DJing and I respect guys like Qbert, DJ Craze and  A-Trak and all those guys, because I know the amount of hours it takes to get to the point where you’re able to execute those techniques. I respect that and I love it, but for me — well, I just went and saw A-Trak DJ and I think he only did one or two scratches the whole time I saw him, so he’s kind of switching up his sound and style which kind of freaked me out because I thought he’d pull out some tricks and do some more scratching, so it just goes to show that people grow, evolve and get into different things.

Last year, in '07, you were in Detroit for Movement, the electronic music festival, and I was wondering what your experience was like as an outsider looking in.
Man, I loved it, it was amazing, it was probably the best festival I did last year. I played the BeatPort tent, which was just absolutely packed and people were going nuts — it was a real amazing vibe. To be honest, I was kind of disappointed that I didn’t get to come back this past year; I was really excited and ready for it, but they said that they didn’t want to have people play back to back years, that they wanted to bring in fresh acts, which is entirely understandable, but at some point I’d love to come back. I got a lot of Myspace messages from the performance and a lot more this year from people asking if I’d be there or asking why I wasn’t there. So, to all those who Myspaced me, trust me, I really wanted to be there — the festival and the crowd at DEMF is just off the hook.

Speaking of Myspace, you’ve been at this for so long I’m curious as to how the Internet has changed things for you.
Well, like it’s done for everything and everyone, it’s gotten me a lot closer to people. Worldwide, I’ve got people from so many different countries getting in touch, mostly through Myspace; every time I go to a different country and play I get a whole bunch of Myspace friend requests, fans that I can instantly communicate with, which, obviously, before the Internet, was unheard of. It just makes me more accessible, too — if people want to know where and when I’m playing, all of the information is right there along with the latest pictures from shows and all that stuff — it’s pretty cool.

Do you use the site to preview tracks and gauge listener response?
I use it more to expose other artists' tracks  that I like. I haven’t really used it to put up unreleased material or anything like that. For up-and-coming DJs and producers whose tracks I like and might want to work into a mix, I like to put ‘em up and get their music out there. I remember when all we were working with was vinyl, that immediacy was impossible. Now the movement of the music from the studio to the dance floor is so fast.

Geographically speaking, do you tailor your sets depending on location? For instance, when you play Bleu in Detroit are you going through the same formulation process you would, say, if you were DJing a rave somewhere in oh, I don’t know, Belgium?
Yeah, but I do that more for the type of crowd. If I’m playing a rave, it might be a harder, more edgy set, but if I’m playing a 21+ club it might be more vocal. But that could happen in the same city to be honest; it could be in Cologne, Germany and you could play a club that has one sort of vibe or a huge rave that just has a different crowd. The same could be said for Detroit; if I’m playing DEMF or if I’m playing at Bleu, I’m going to play for the specific crowd.

What’s your post-performance wind-down like?
[laugh] Every show is different; sometimes I have a flight to catch at 7 a.m. and I don’t even get done DJing ‘til 4 a.m., so I go to the hotel, shower pack and take off right away. Other times, like if I haven’t slept in two days, I’ll get back to the hotel and immediately crash, but then sometimes, like if I’m in Las Vegas, I’ll get pulled out to the strip club after the show and then there’s always the after-party thing to deal with, too.

And that’s not even taking into consideration that while your DJing you’re forced to watch a sea of girls shake their ass in front of you for three hours or more. I’d bet it’s hard to just chill out. Is there a city that comes to mind that you recognize as having the sexiest women in the audience?
Without hesitation, I’ve always said that as a country, Colombia has the hottest women that I’ve ever seen — just amazingly beautiful women. But if we’re talking about America, then we’re talking about San Diego, Las Vegas, Scottsdale, Arizona — in the warm climate cities I think the girls just get used to showing their bodies all the time — they’re in shape, they got fake boobs, they’re just putting themselves out there more — at least more so than places like Rochester, New York or some place like that. [laugh]

So, is it hard to enter into any serious relationships having the job that you do?
Yeah, but I don’t think it’s because I’m surrounded by a ton of attractive women all the time, I think it has more to do with the fact that I travel so much and I’m never really home for that long. Ya know, if your girlfriend works a nine-to-five, Monday through Friday, and she wants to spend some time with you on the weekends, well, that’s most likely when I’m out of town.

So, I take it you aren’t in a relationship.
No, I mean that’s the problem I have, man, is the time. And when I am home, I’m usually in the studio for really long hours throughout the week working on an album or trying to run the label, so the work is constant. It’s hard …

Speaking of work, you’re working on a new album right now, right?
Yeah — I think it’s coming out in February of ’09. We’re basically done with the album, we’re just tweaking it out and maybe making a last-minute addition, but for the most part it’s already done and we’re working on remixes for the first single right now.

Is it hard to have completed something that has to now sit on the shelves for the next seven months?
It is frustrating, to be honest, but for an artist album, as opposed to a mix CD, it’s different. On a mix CD the songs get old really quick, so you have to get it out really fast, but for an artist album, these are songs nobody’s heard before. A good song is a good song, so if it’s a good song now, it’ll be a good song six months from now. You can always do remixes and release singles, so I don’t get too upset. I think that the label knows what they’re doing so I’m totally cool to roll with it and let them set it up the way they think is best.

Let’s clear something up real quick. Pre-1989 DMC battle, that featured the infamous de-robing and “titty-scratch,” you already had the name Bad Boy Bill, though I’ve heard some claim that you made that name up for that infamous evening.
It started out when I first started DJing in the early-‘80s, but one of my boys would always say that my DJ name was Bad Boy Bill and he ended up putting it on a flyer and ever since then it just stuck. That was how it all started, but yeah, it was way before that DMC battle.

It’s been almost 20 years since that night, when you pulled your pants down and attempted to scratch the record with your dick, has it been hard to live it down?
Naw, man, I mean it’s funny. You know, I just met [DJ] Dirty South a couple months ago here in Chicago and he was like, “Hey! I just saw your YouTube video of the DMC thing yesterday!” What’s funny is that the video had been laying on a VHS tape for years and years and no one knew about it, unless you were a battle aficionado, and then all of a sudden someone found it and put it on YouTube and now everyone’s talkin’ 'bout it like it happened yesterday. I’d actually done that trick in battles before that competition and it was always funny. I’m not ashamed of it — but it’s funny that it’s getting all this exposure now.

Bill, thanks for taking the time to chat, man. We’ll see you soon.
Absolutely, man. Ya know, I really love Detroit, it’s always an amazing party. I feel that Detroit has really shown me a lot of love and I’m excited to see everyone down at Bleu.  | RDW

Bad Boy Bill • 8/22 • Bleu Room Experience

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