As is the case with many artists and performers today, they tend to sell out once they hit it big and rise to the top. It may be that they have succumbed to the temptations of major mainstream revenue, or perhaps they just feel that there’s no reason to screw up a good thing. Whatever the reason(s) may be, these musicians have opted to settle for their single working formula thereby ceasing to push boundaries and experiment with new forms of artistic expression. Who’s to say that a trance DJ can’t cross over to the dubstep universe? Or why should a drummer from the 80s being ridiculed for entering the electronic/DJ realm?
Life is the constant pursuit of knowledge, experiences and happiness. As such, individuals should strive to quench an insatiable thirst for learning new things, meeting different people, undergoing foreign sensations, and expanding limitless horizons. One such musician who epitomizes all these aspects is a man by the name of Joel Zimmerman, also known as Deadmau5. We’ve been following him for quite some time now and only recently have we fully come to appreciate his endeavors and true dedication to creative progression. Constantly pushing the envelope, Joel is now making his foray into dubstep production. What’s more is that following a vast array of responses on forums to his new musical endeavor (both good and bad), he simply responds with, ”I’m just fucking around and practicing guys…you gotta switch it up every once and a while to keep sharp.” We rest our case.
Have a listen to Joel’s “Dub5tepthingie” below and check out the most recent works-in-progress on his Suncloud page: fuckmylife.
Also, during our research-induced insomnia, we discovered a handful of other interesting (and bad-ass) tidbits on the Mau5:
- Deadmau5 performed at the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver on February 19, 2010 during the live medal presentations for men’s luge doubles and women’s 15-km individual and men’s 20-km individual biathalon. His track “Moar Ghosts N’ Stuff” was aired on national TV when it was played over loudspeakers during Hannah Kearney’s gold-medal run in women’s moguls.
- Joel also put on a free Olympic performance at LiveCity Yaletown that drew over 20,000 attendees to an 8,000-person venue. People began waiting in line at 11am and even after they reached capacity at 5:30pm (show was at 9:30pm), thousands of fans stayed and turned the entire outside area into a raging dance party. [full story here]
- Currently under design and production is a brand-new, state-of-the-art Mau5head weighing about 10lbs and possibly featuring a shoulder harness. Inside the head, there’s to be a video system installed displaying all of his audio monitors, essentially making the entire thing into a giant set of virtual reality glasses…and also thus preventing him from seeing anything outside of the head in the process. This should be interesting.
- Unlike many other DJs that only use turntables and software-loaded laptops, Joel performs with a variable cornucopia of music hardware including: 2 MacBook Pros, custom-built shuttle PCs, Pioneer DJM-800, Xone:4D, Monome 256, JazzMutant Lemur, Percussa AudioCubes and ton of other effect controllers. All these components allow him to perform live and insert unique sequences within each set.
- In December 2007, Marcus Schossow, Maor Levi and Dj Eco created a project named, Deadrat6, to rip on Deadmau5 for having similar sounding tracks. Their spoof song titled, “Very Exactly,” was actually played by Armin Van Buuren on “A State of Trance 330.” Later on, Deadmau5 refused to perform at a club in Oslo if Marcus Schossow was allowed to play afterward. This led to Schossow being denied entry and made the night a solo Deadmau5 event.
- Back in ‘08, Deadmau5 joined forces with Mötley Crüe drummer, Tommy Lee (who now produces electronic music and DJs), DJ Aero, and Steve Duda under the name of, “WTF?” to produce a handful of tracks such as, “Chicken,” “You Can’t Afford This,” “Redic,” and “CEBA55555.” Oh, and Joel briefly toured with Tommy Lee and DJ Aero for their Electro Mayhem Tour too…
- Finally here are a couple of videos from last year–one of Joel gettin’ tatted up with Tommy Lee and model Chanel Benton in London and the other of him dropping “Strobe” at SPACE in Ibiza (wait until 4:15!):
That’s all for now…PEA5E!
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