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Everyone and their furry boots were ready for RJD2 on Sunday afternoon as the sun began to set on the second day of Movement ’09. With a stack of records cleanly categorized behind the turntable traditionalist, RJD2 quickly shuffled through his funk, soul and lightly rock ‘n’ rollified collection of tracks — pulling heavily from fan favorite albums Deadringer and Since We Last Spoke — smoothly worked up the crowd with his charismatic microphone moxy. “So, what do you guys want to do now?” jokingly inquired RJD2 halfway through his set. “Should we just go home?” And, like sweaty clockwork, the droves of funk frenzied fans declared, “No!” in what seemed like perfect unison. “Let’s get to work then,” quipped the man with the plan before mashing up The Cars’ classic Let The Good Times Roll with his own hip-hop influenced creation of distorted guitars and bouncing beats.

As day turned to night and the fog machines began to roll their mysterious magic across the stage, RJD2 briefly schooled the crowd on the “douche bag” nature of the music industry before introducing the highly cinematic mash-ups of Z-Trip — one of the few in the industry who luckily does not fall into such a category, he explained. Detroit was treated to a highly spontaneous, exclusive collaboration from two of the world’s biggest DJs for over twenty minutes on the Red Bull Music Academy stage before we dragged RJD2 from backstage (where he was exchanging phone numbers with Ed Banger Records’ Busy P and Krazy Baldhead, and signing loads of autographs) to the Red Bull Green Room for a bit of one-on-one table time of the most surreal sorts.

It was oddly refreshing to see you make a few mistakes during your set and acknowledge such error to the audience, all the while with a smile on your face.

RJD2: I arranged the whole set so it relies as much as possible on the human element, and gets away from all the safety nets that technology brings along.

Watching Z-Trip from the stage with you was really surreal. To be honest, I felt a little bit like a rock star … and quickly began thinking about ego. Looking into the eyes of hundreds upon hundreds of fans is something you’ve gotten pretty used to, but have you ever wrestled with an out-of-control ego?

RJD2: To be honest, no. For whatever reason, I’ve made a conscious effort to differentiate what happens on stage and in the world of music, and what happens in real life. In real life, there are plenty of things that remind you that you are not important. I’m involved with music and make records or whatever, but it doesn’t mean anything. If you go check in to grab a flight or grab a bagel at a coffee shop or something, they don’t give a shit. If you act like an asshole, you’re going to get treated like an asshole. That guy making your bagel is not going to care who you are, you know?

And when it comes to your close friends, you’re obviously living a very different lifestyle … unless your entire family is a group of traveling, successful musicians.

RJD2: (laughs) There certainly are barriers. I avoid talking about my day job unless it is forced to come up. I’ve give you an example. A friend of mine in my neighborhood has brunch at their house every Sunday, and I was there this past weekend. It’s sort of an open invitation sort of thing, so there are new people there periodically. I was sitting next to this couple that I had never met before, and the issue of “what do you do for a living?” came up. I’m pretty shy when it comes to that sort of thing because there is no easy way to say, “I’m RJD2. I’m a DJ and I travel the world and play music.” I was dancing around the subject, and they accused me of being “real cagey” about it. Sometimes, you can’t navigate those things as deftly as you think you can…

After hanging around the Red Bull Green Room for a few minutes and convincing RJD2 that he would make a solid music journalist, the multi-instrumentalist quickly headed back to the Red Bull Music Academy stage to catch the rest of Z-Trip — the only performance he’d be able to attend while at the festival. With earplugs in, head nodding to the beat and his casual dress, RJD2 perched at the back of the stage, looking out into his own cubicle and his own stack of paperwork — an ocean of people, celebrating music together and RJD2 looking out at all of them with the best seat in the house.

Words by Ryan Patrick Hooper, photos by Joe Gall

 

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