djnikadeemas

https://djnikadeemas.wordpress.com/ https://hearthis.at/djnikadeemas/ https://www.mixcloud.com/djnikadeemas/ https://soundcloud.com/djnikadeemas Some background info on me... Hi my name's DJ Nikadeemas My close friends call me DJ, my peers and music industry affiliates call me Nik. My favorite color is black, I love peanut butter cookies going to the theatre and taking in new films (either Hollywood or independently distributed releases). I appreciate smoke free environments, banilla milkshakes, home cooked meals and fine Indian cuisine. My favorite basketball team was the Atlanta Hawks when Dominic Wilkins was still the NBA's slam dunk champion and I used to love the Oakland Raiders while Ray Guy was still punting before they ended up relocating to Los Angeles in the early 80's. Lastly I'm a shoe whore and love collecting mixtapes and records. Now about my adolescence... A lot can be explained by the fact my father first met my mother at a Knights Of Columbus dance when he was deejaying records in the mid 60's and she just so happen to bring in a slew of new records for him to play since she's always been highly appreciative of music. So you can say the bug was created before I was conceived in '71 in a trailer (which would probably place me lower on the scale then Marshall Mathers). This would safely assume that I was raised in the era of Hippies since we never owned a TV and I did home schooling up to age six. Music was the biggest cultural intrigue I can recall from such an early state of life either being CCR, The Doors, Moody Blues, ABBA, The Beatles, Jefferson Airplane, Simon & Garfunkle, etc; etc.. Fortunately I'm a bi-product of domestic trouble thus I grew up with the guidance of both my mother and father as neither knew how too raise offspring on a mutual level. Around the latter part of '82 I moved in with my mother for quite sometime to be given the luxury of cable television for the very first time and something which was just being debuted across the country, MTV. Yes, I'm a part of the MTV Generation so knowing such wonderful facts as Def Leppard's "Photograph" owning Friday Night Video Fights and world premiers of Michael Jackson's "Thriller", The Cars' "Hello Again" and Madonna's "Material Girl" are just a minor facet of my remedial childhood. About this time I caught wind of a phenomenon known to the video generation as Euro-pop, ala A Flock Of Seagulls (still my all-time favorite group), Duran Duran, The Fixx, Thomas Dolby and Depeche Mode. My first vinyl purchase would be the full length album of A Flock Of Seagulls which was apart of my weekly allowance stipend since I was only eleven years old at the time. As time grew and the vast interest from radio to video became a transcending factor in the media's overwhelming take on electronic pop-culture I was lead about by social awareness from my peers in middle school: Adam Ant, Billy Idol, The Scorpions, Quiet Riot, Psychedelic Furs, Romeo Void, Modern English, A-ha, Peter Schilling, Wham, ABC, Gary Numan, etc. Shortly after Prince's remarkable "Purple Rain" debut, more selections followed by Morris Day and The Time, Jesse Johnson, Sheila E. and numerous other afro-centric club music which propelled my interest into electronic sub-culture: namely electro-hip hop (not rap music). I was a large collector of West Coast electro: The Unknown DJ, World Class Wreckin' Cru, Ice T, L.A. Dream Team and the Egyptian Lover long before any of these producers started exploring the gangsta side of hip hop. After being shifted around a bunch from parent to parent and slowly collecting mixtapes off the radio and trading with other people I settled down in Portland, Oregon where I hooked up with my longtime friend who introduced me more so to East Coast hip hop and faster scratchin' techniques that I never really bothered pursuing thus my adoration for: Mantronix, Just Ice, T La Rock, UTFO, Whodini, Run-DMC, LL Cool J, Davy DMX, Stetsasonic, Newcleus, Malcolm Mclaren, and a ton of others. As I grew and moved around more (a total of 17 schools I attended) I ended up in my High School years in the middle of nowhere just south of the Canadian Border in Washington State that really didn't prosper me much for vinyl collecting except when I went to Seattle or Spokane, Washington or Vancouver B.C. where I became aware of the current fad from the tabloids of Spin and Billboard which spoke of Acieed House music from London, Chicago and New York. A big factor in my life took place at this moment, to either continue appreciating hip hop culture which suddenly became a media frenzy from Fab 5 Freddie on the pilot of Yo! MTV Raps or clammer to the very underground culture that was becoming all the rage several thousands of miles away from me. I chose Acieed House and what followed that continued my quest for deejaying and mixtape collecting. I eventually finished off school away from parents with the perennial care of my aunt and uncle who thought I was some sort of Satanist with the evil music I was into (their opinions were a few years premature). I got caught up in reading many different trade journals from local rock newspapers to tip-sheets for the serious collector that set me on one too many trips back and forth from San Francisco to Seattle where I collected: Black Box, 808 State, Lil Louis, Snap, ZYX Techndrome Int'l comps to New Beat selections from Jade 4U, Lords Of Acid to Atahualpa, Greater Than One, Meat Beat Manifesto, Consolidated, Tricky Disco , Holy Ghost Inc., Bassomatic, S'Express, 2 In A Room (where I was first introduced to Omar Santana), Technotronic, M/A/R/R/S and Simon Harris' co-productions on Music Of Life, etc; etc As I continued to explore the finer sounds of life I was made aware how simple it was to gain knowledge of music by simply picking up a phone and making contact with people in the interest of being added to there mailing list for promotional consideration. My friend and I then moved forward by starting the first all mixed format techno show on KBOO 90.7 FM back in '91 which were actually done all in my apartment as pre-productions tapes to then give us the luxury of sitting back and recording the actual broadcast and fielding calls at the strangest of hours in the morning on a bi-monthly basis (this only lasted for about 3 months). Then something wonderful happened which turned my abysmal life too the better. A dear old friend of mine (name withheld) came-up the West Coast line from San Diego to initiate the Rave Movement which somehow landed on my doorstep as he was sparked by the knowledge of our production skills so as to have my partner and I perform at this party he was planning on throwing in Seattle, Washington. Fortunately for us we never made it since all hell broke loose and he disappeared with the ticket money to Canada (for liner notes: please check a column that I co- contributed for Slurp! Magazine/ Under One Sky back in '93). This all spurred the interest of the local scene which would then make us a viable part of it by becoming the music directors of the first all techno-rave club in downtown Portland: The Park Ave. (aka The Scream). Many a tape was recorded from our nightly sets that have accumulated in the hundreds over the years. As the rave fuel of '92 died out and headed more to progressive-house in early '93 I backed away from the clubscene and started doing independent raves and began my mail-order business (Inport Land) which brought me in contact with several labels, producers and distributors: Hithouse, Lower East Side, Musik Reseach/ Zoth Ommog, Reflective, Antler-Subway, Experimental/ 4th floor, Analog, JDC, Record Time, Silent, Watts Music. The last of whom I eventually landed a job with on the whim that my account rep lobbied on my behalf, of course my letter of recommendation sealed it. They flew me out to the East Coast where I ended up moving in with Omar Santana (H2OH/ Tricked Out Recordings) and doing much of the A&R work for him as well as the ever memorable jacket design for Tricked Out Recordings which was created by an old friend of mine back home Willard E. Love (who now works for George Lucas Industrial Light & Magic). Omar afforded me the greatest of opportunities to meet with people of whom I'd never have gained the chance of making there acquaintance had I just came alone without knowledge of the Big Apple. From studio sessions with Albert Cabrera (Cutting Records, Latin Rascals), Carlos 'After Dark' Berrios, Arthur Baker, Damon Wild, Dennis Ferrer, Frankie Bones, Lenny Dee, Scott Weiser (Dynamix II), the list goes on and on. Time went on and on and gradually I became ever effected by my work so much that in 1997 I quit working for Watts Music and set-up Syntax Distribution with three other people whom were all co-workers of mine back in day. Through this move I became as John Selway (Satellite Records at the time) and Adam X (Sonic Groove) rightly know the end all for techno one-stop shopping in North America. I was Anthony Viera's (Raoul Delgardo) right hand man in the states from Integrale Muzique Limited shortly after he left Plastichead in '97 to begin his campaign for Karl O'Connor (Regis) and Peter Sutton (Female) and the rest of the clan from the West Midlands. I simply wanted to push the sound that wasn't there when I was at Watts and this was my opportunity to shake the dancefloors from Los Angeles to Dallas to Toronto to Washington DC to Miami and of course NYC. I did it slowly and surely with everything from Miro's "Hall" release which was caned by everyone from Jonathan Peters to Junior Vasquez and Johnny Vicious. To the melodic clickhouse of Michael Mayer and Reinhard Voigt on Kompakt and the hotly tipped darker retro stylings of Alessandro F's Kobayashi/ Dancefloor Killers label which no one apart from I were picking up on in '98. The music was revolutionary and times were great on the Isle of Manhattan where we were first located in midtown until outgrowing our confines and relocating to Long Island City in Queens (up until the towers collapsed in 2001 then life changed and sales declined for the worse). I'm not going to claim any one brand of music was my favorite but after bringing in so much damn filtered disco house, hardcore gabber and electro-clash before it became a fad in 2002 my life was over immersed with music and gradually I lost the desire to care much for anything new as I foresaw the evolution of file sharing and it's breach on the state of electronic music culture for monetary gain. Thus I withdrew myself entirely and resigned from the industry to simply take a step back and look at what I caused which to this day makes me feel very content that I was an integral part of the modern day dance culture in the mid to late 90's in the United States before calling it quits in 2002.