Author: akadjblaze

Working, teaching and DJn in the ROK

PKDC – Pioneer Korea DJ Compitition

by akadjblaze, posted in Events

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Its a bit of a mouthful trying to say Pioneer Korea DJ Competition or PKDC, anyways, last thurs 13 Sept, I went along to check out the finals of the PKDC held at Club Holic, Sinsa, in Seoul. (and yes I know the English in the poster is terrible, you would think they would get someone to help them out with this huh, thou not that my English is any better at times…)

Now as far as DJ comps go, Korea doesn’t really have many that I know of, there is no DMC or the now defunct ITF, they have had one of the Heineken Comps here I think 2 years ago as a one off type of thing. Obviously my lack of Korean and not being Korean doesn’t really help when it comes to researching about this kind of thing. I have come across a couple of what seem to be smaller online comps run from some of the DJ Korea member sites, but these don’t seem to hold any real weight except the Beat 4 Battle, which seems to basically be a jam session for the scratch DJs which is cool.

But at least Korea does finally have 2 comps worthy of note and both are international ones as well. Firstly (and this was the first year for it in Korea) is the Redbull Thre3style Comp (which I myself entered) which is fastly become a world recognized and legit comp and the PKDC (which I didn’t know how to enter lol) which seems to be still more of an up and coming comp and centered in the asia region and I think this is either the 3rd or 4th year its been running.

So anyways, I know a couple of the DJs who are performing (since I met them at the Rebull comp, shout out to Enduke and Pandol and also DJ DD who was also in the house watching) so was glad to be able to go along and support some people I know. So here is a low down on the night…

Starting time, well of course it was late, these things always are, so chilled out while they did the soundcheck, caught up with the DJs and some other people, then finally first up was DJ Enduke, he had a really solid set, had some nice cuts and some cool mixes and music selection, def felt he deserved 2nd place  (Check out his set here)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwmMK9jONyU

The format for the comp was 3 Hip Hop Style DJs who each had around 5-8mins to perform and 3 House style DJs who had around 13mins. Only equipment they could use was 4 Pioneer CDJs and a Pioneer Mixer (so no serato etc)

Second on was DJ Minor Flava, he was also pretty tight, again with some cool track selections but I felt it lacked variety which is prob why he came in 3rd (Check out his set here)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqNH9sFUaaA

Final DJ for the Hip Hop section was DJ Pandol, fresh off of winning the Redbull Comp and also taking out the PKDC last year he was def the favorite to win and overall he didn’t disappoint. His usual custom intro was pretty nice, I did think his cuts sounded a little messy thou, and also some of his juggles fell off a bit but the overall sound and feel of the set and use of a wide ranger of techniques is what most likely won him 1st place (Check out his set here)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUYRjiHs6jo

Next up was the house section, now Im not much of a house DJ also not overly into the music so I wont give an extensive review on them but you can check them out for yourself once I get the vids uploaded to youtube. However I will say the 3 of them did a good job, they had some nice remixes and song selection, they weren’t overly creative with their mixing thou but their transitions were mostly good and they controlled the energy nicely (thou at times it was a little off). My favorite set from the house section would have to be DJ Heroin Juices, I liked his intro tracks which created a nice buzz for his set.

At the end of the day from a DJ’s perspective, I think the results were pretty right given I don’t know what the judging criteria was (maybe in both sections 1st and 2nd places could be debatable as I think there were both pretty close) So shout outs to all the DJs who competed, and ill def be competing next year!

HIPHOP

1st DJ Pandol, 2nd DJ ENDUKE, 3rd DJ MinorFlava

HOUSE
1st DJ INI-K, 2nd DJ Heroinjuice, 3rd DJ KAY-SEOB

Some Sad Truths

by akadjblaze, posted in Got Issues?

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So once again its that time of year when documentaries run wild with stories and theories etc surrounding those infamous moments that shocked the western world and has forever changed the world as we know it. While this might sound just as extreme as some of the nonsense that has said to have come of this, it is a sad truth no matter how big or small its effect has been on each individual person that things are indeed different from what they were before

But here is the thing, no matter what your view is on what really happened that day, and as you can read from the photo above, there is still so many questions left un answered, it still happened, and as a result, lives were lost, family members and friends going about their day to day lives, the people flying in those planes, and the rescue workers with no thought of self preservation, only of that to help others, these were lives that were lost during such a tragic event, that is the sad truth no matter what conspiracy theory you believe

Other sad truths is that from such a tragic event, comes great stories of survival and of selfless acts. Some of these stories are truly amazing and its a sad fact that only stories like these can come from something so horrible. 

Another sad truth is that racial profiling and stereotyping has escalated to such a level that hate crimes and discrimination is almost a natural way of life

Air travel will never be the same again as well as privacy laws and the term innocent until proven guilty unless your a suspected terrorist 

While im just writing these off the top of my head and is merely just a post of thought on the matter. But one of the things that I have been wondering about lately is this, America is adamant that this was an attack on their country and on their freedom and on everyone else’s freedom as well and by this measure are using this as their scape goat excuse to flex their military might around the world in the guise of protecting freedom. Here is my question, freedom from what? What exactly were these people attacking? (dismissing conspiracy theories here for a moment) 

Firstly the attacked the World Trade Centre, is this not the supposed centre for the world markets, how is attacking this building an attack on peoples every day freedom? Could it not be an attack on the cooperate world? An attack on the people that basically run the world and dictate terms, that hold the average person in debt for their entire lives, isnt it more of an attack on our oppressors rather than an attack on our freedom? 

Secondly the attack on the pentagon, basically command and control centre for american troops and finally if it was going to hit there, the last plane was maybe destined for the white house, the symbol of americans government, this doesn’t seem to be an attack on the people but maybe rather an attack on American influence overseas (aka deployed troops) and foreign policy (aka the white house)?

You know they often call these people terrorists but most of the time all they are really doing is fighting for what they believe in or fighting for their own freedom, the difference between what they are doing and what the western world often does, if you look closely at it, is often not much at all.

As I said these are mainly questions and different lines of thought, not opinions or facts. Thoughts that are def up for debate or to lead to other lines of thinking. Thats the true freedom we enjoy in this world, the freedom to think what we want and how we want, most other freedoms are just an illusion.

Blog Up

by akadjblaze, posted in A day in the Life

So here it is, once again trying to see if I can not only get a blog up and running but actually maintain it and keep it going and updated… Yeah I keep telling myself good luck with that! I do manage to keep my facebook pretty much up to date so why cant I try and focus that attention here into something a little more constructive instead of just the random day to day generic crap that comes out of the majority of social networking sites. I also think to myself I really need to get my own website, kinda makes sense being a DJ and all. But while I try and figure out the best way to do that, might as well start sharing things that happen in my life here in Korea, and how I am probably not living the life of your typical English Teacher here, and now with recent events, follow me as I struggle to get my way deeper into the DJ scene here and hopefully land that all important residency somewhere big! But also posting up whatever else I come across in my day to day life, be it random shit in the street or subways, playing video games, funny ass facebook photos, current issues, new fashion/kicks etc basically anything is a go esp new mixes and videos as well! Chur