Neil Feineman | ChinaShop

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Music FlyLo But Aim High

May 29, 2009 - 11:46 am

Forget J-Lo. There’s a new kid in town called Flying Lotus or, to his fans, FlyLo. In the past several years, Flying Lotus, whose real name is Stephen Ellison, has won accolades for his first album, 2006′s 1983, and last year’s Los Angeles, released by prestigious Warp Records.

That’s not a bad beginning for someone whose work is virtually impossible to classify. Ironically, he has as much trouble labeling it as anyone else. When pressed, he comes up with the term, psychedelic beats. When that draws blank stares, he refines it with “hip-hop rooted in psychedelic rock.”

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Event Gallery I’m on a Boat!

by Neil Feineman, Ryan Patrick Hooper, Dustin Downing, and Joe Gall

May 28, 2009 - 9:15 am

Before the festival, there were the parties. And while there are great party towns, few can match Detroit’s. So when the official Paxahau “I’m on the Boat” party, held Sunday night, was announced shortly before the festival, it quickly became the “buzz” afterparty of the weekend.

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Music Kenneth Thomas: Tranced Out in Detroit

by Dustin Downing and Neil Feineman

May 28, 2009 - 9:13 am

Kenneth Thomas is one of the most successful DJs coming out of Detroit. He’s had a number one record on Beatport, has won Detroit DJ of the Year in the alternative weekly annual polls and is finishing an eagerly awaited artist album for Perfecto Records. But the only place you’ll find him in at Movement is in the audience. Because Kenneth Thomas doesn’t play techno. Or house. He plays progressive house and trance. And those are fighting words to the Detroit hardcore techno scene.

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Featured Music Ryan Elliot and the Plight of the American DJ

by Neil Feineman and Dustin Downing

May 25, 2009 - 11:04 am

If techno were a comic book, Ryan Elliott would be one of its superheroes. For the past ten years, he takes his daily run and heads to his day job in the finance department of Ford Motors. But once the sun comes down, he becomes one of America’s most popular young DJs, flying across the Atlantic or the heartland twice a month, to do what he loves.

After a high-energy, house-fueled two-hour set at the Red Bull Music Academy Stage at Movement on Saturday, Ryan [who, in the interest of disclosure, is also a friend] gave us the lowdown on what it’s really like to be a man with a double life. We began with one simple question: Since he’s no stranger to a good time and has become Luftansa’s new best friend, how the hell has he held onto his job with one of the big three?

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Music Invading the Techno Nation: The Prodigy Hit Detroit

by Neil Feineman and Joe Gall

May 24, 2009 - 10:33 pm

Back in the early 1990s, The Prodigy, for better or worse, were thought by many to be the future of music. With songs and videos for “Firestarter” and “Smack My Bitch Up,” they were shocking, rude and controversial. Now, some 15 years later, they are back on the road, promoting a new album, Invaders Must Die, and sporting the original trio of Liam Howlett, Keith Flint and Maxim Reality for the first time since 1997. This time around, the stakes are high with nothing less at risk than their credibility.

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Event Movement: Why Detroit Matters

by Neil Feineman

May 24, 2009 - 10:29 pm

In the beginning, there was only an unlikely pitch. What if Detroit, by 2000 already one of the most depressed, violent, financially challenged cities in the country, gave a free festival in Hart Plaza, the downtown river walk/concrete park, honoring techno music? What if Detroit were filled with people from all over the world on Memorial Day, having the time of their lives, raining serious coin on local merchants throughout the city?

Proving that truth is stranger than fiction, the city bought the idea. Thanks largely to a generous sponsorship package from Ford, which was introducing a new car, the Techno, DEMF (Detroit Electronic Music Festival) was green lit. And techno, which had been invented in Detroit, got its own festival — even though many of the people responsible for the decision had no idea what techno really was.

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Music Chester French and the End of the Soft Sell

by Neil Feineman

May 11, 2009 - 9:41 am

At a time when the collapse of the music business has become a cliche and the major labels objects of derision, Chester French, a duo of Harvard grads whose names are neither Chester nor French, may well be the exception that proves the rule.

The two guys, Max and D.A., are one of those six-years-in-the-making overnight successes who turned their dorm-room obsession with mixtapes and pop music into a career the old-fashioned way: one fan at a time. In true Cinderella fashion, a few of those fans were famous, as in Kanye West, Jimmy Iovine and Pharrell, whose label, Star Trak, released their first album, Love the Future, on April 21.

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Miami Sunday School for Degenerates

by Neil Feineman

April 21, 2009 - 10:09 pm

If there was one thing that was evident this year, it was how closely “tribes” stuck together and how little cross pollination.

There were the pool parties but now that Beatport charges for their event, conference week lost its one great free networking event. Its DNS were top notch and mercifully less commercial than those at the Shelborne, Surfcomber and Nikki’s, where spring break was more the order of the day. Maybe that’s why my favorite pool party of all was the South Seas South Philly pool party. The pool itself had the charm of an urban watering hole, and if the bodies were less perfect than those at the swanky parties, the dancing, the music and the vibe had a gritty rawness the others couldn’t buy.

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Miami Miami Vices – Until Next Year…

by Neil Feineman

April 21, 2009 - 10:08 pm

Miami’s like a ghost town, populated by a handful of zombified veterans, delaying re-entry as long as possible. Tales of old conferences have been told; reasons to return discussed. And good-byes, some with an air of possible finality, were exchanged.

But so were reasons to return, like the boat party, Sunday School and John Digweed’s throw-down at the Vagabond. At least in Digweed’s case, that has as much to do with the club as it does the DJ.

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Miami Sunday School for Electro Sinners

by Neil Feineman

April 21, 2009 - 10:08 pm

Miami has never been known for its service, political consciousness or sensitivity. But tourism is big business here and Winter Music Conference is one of its big cash cows. So you wouldn’t be out of line to expect the city to go out of its way to do everything it can to at least feign an interest in consumer satisfaction.

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