First, how’s everyone enjoying the amazing DEMF coverage on RV? Good stuff, huh? Who does video better??

OK, so now back to Part Two of my Blog which speaks to project in my life that really opened a lot of doors, the release of Boogaloo. Brooklyn. 3.23pm.

Last we left off, I had just hosted an amazing party at the small lounge in Brooklyn (named Boogaloo for those who forgot) with Tyrant (Craig Richards + Lee Burridge) on a Wednesday night.

Shortly after that I began to discuss with the owner of the lounge, Chance that we should release a CD for the bar thats indicative of the vibe and nights we had there. Besides the Wednesday soirée that was a huge success, we had many a crazy night at this small lounge, often times going well past closing hours. I fondly remember around 4:30am, the bartenders would pull down the shades overlooking the street and we would keep the party going. The crowd would be a mixed back, some would say even a bit rogue-ish; but they were all there to have a good time. Often the parties would end in daylight with a few continuing on, and that’s how I came up with the concept of the music for the CD – a soundtrack for after-hours. The number 3:23pm was random in choice, left up to interpretation. We wanted to assign a time not normally connected to electronic music, but for those who understand and were at Boogaloo, they would simply smirk at the time, since it was known that some of the afterhours would go into the afternoon.

I spent nearly two years on the project from beginning to end, living off of peanuts, in between jobs barely scraping by, my girlfriend at the time hating me because of how consumed I was with this project, (I remember one studio sessions beginning around 9pm and going until 8am, leaving and seeing people go to work) and running into obstacle after obstacle on why this project should have never been completed. The only reason this ever went to market, I would say is perseverance. There’s no need to go into all of the obstacles, but there are those out there that know what I’m talking about. You only feel this when you care more about the project than yourself, and you’ll stop at nothing to see it through. I didn’t really know I had it in me, until I went through it. It’s live-changing for sure, and you see yourself in a different light when it’s over. In a bad way, it did consume me, almost as if I was on a crusade at some point, trying to prove everyone wrong, and needing help to remember why I’m doing this in the first place – because I believe in the music.

The moment I walked into Virgin Megastore in Union Square to play on in-store DJ set to promote the CD, I was eerily calm, some would say not feeling well, or something was wrong. But I knew exactly what was going on, and I was taking it all in, and it was incredible. The feeling of seeing your CD on the shelves next to the likes of Ricardo Villalobos and Sasha is something I’ll never forget (And I took pics to make sure!). But the best part was seeing my close friends and people come out to support. Not everyone attended, which was heart-breaking, but perhaps I turned off a few people in my pursuit, and lost touch with them. Even better, was that people honestly seemed to enjoy the CD! They interpreted it as to how they wanted – some thought it was a great to listen to after a heavy night, others liked to drive to it, and my friends who weren’t into electronic music liked to cook to it! But that was the point, let the music and vibe of the CD take you where you want it.

What I learned from the experience was invaluable. From working with a music lawyer to licensing music to working in the professional studio mixing and mastering the mix with an engineer, to working with a distributor to, most importantly learning how to work with magazines and websites for press. I sent out hundreds of envelopes with cover letters, basically begging them to review the CD!! This paid off with loads of reviews, which for me, helped justify the musical choice and direction (Yes, I admit, I needed validation since I was unknown). (See below for a few reviews the CD garnered) All of this work has helped with Hidden Recordings also, as the groundwork for my relationship with the press had already been done. The Boogaloo experience was a crash course in the music industry, and combine that with working in a nightclub, I was learning (the hard way) about the business.

To this day, this is the project I am most proud of. It was before Hidden Recordings, before Dieter, before gigs all over, before producing, before really anything. It’s the reason now I can write this blog to you

Here are a few excerpts from what the press said about the CD:

Thanks for reading this blog, and in the next one, you’ll finally get to meet Dieter Krause….

Tags: Deepak Sharma, Minimal, New York City, Techno