Its DJ Grab Bag Day!!!!1

In honor of GBD, I present the single CD DJs, or DJs I own only one album of theirs and subsequently cannot trace their careers as DJs.

Carl Cox: Live at Area2 in Detroit
If you wanted to test out some Subwoofers this is the album for you. The entire album, all 18 tracks goes “Boom Boom Boom Boom” all the way from start to finish. For me this is some rollout jams. I also own a Carl Cox album, but its original material not beat matched or strung together in a set so it doesn’t make it onto this list. But from listenings to that album and as well as this one plus views of his sets on YouTube, I have deduced his style very straight forward. And I mean straight forward, there is no mystery in it what so ever. If you wanted consistency in your dance music, Cox is your man. I personally cannot take more than ten tracks off of this album purely for the reason that he doesn’t change it up. There is only so much four on the floor house you can take. But sometimes I find myself in a mood for an album that isn’t complicated, isn’t awash in delirious synths or raging females. Its straight unfiltered house, and every once in a while Cox will jump on the mic, mute the lows and tell Detroit to keep it up. Hell yeah.

Chemical Brothers: Brother’s gonna work it out

Jesus Christ is this album good. The Chem’s started out as DJs, and they put this album together after Dig Your Own Hole in honor of their past career. They still DJ on occasion, and I would eat my left foot to see them live. This album will have to do. It gets a perfect score for not only being a brilliant collection, but also encapsulating all those early sets into a comprehensive 5 track album. And each of those five tracks containing no less than three songs in them! Hands down these guys are my favorite act in music, and it escapes me why they don’t put out more DJ efforts. Not that I am upset, their original material (which finds it way into this album in unrealeased remixes as well as the inclusion of some hellacious B-sides) is among nextest shit in the world. They start out with Willie Hutch and move it into “Not another Drugstore”! and the unreleased remix of “Everything must go”! You cant find a lot of these tracks nowadays, except on this album so buy it, if you cant steal it, if that violates your moral or ethics just borrow it. This album major thumbs up.

Liam Howlett (the Prodigy): Sessions from the dirt chamber part one

I wonder if the part one is joke in the vein of Mel Brook’s History of the World Part One, in that their will never be a part two. Its been about 8 years and no sophomore effort yet, and that’s a damn shame. This is a great album, and the only scratch album that itto the list and for that matter the countdown. The reasons for this is that, at it's heart it’s a DJ comp, not an original effort like many of DJs that might spring to your mind as you read this. It is also for this reason that many of the hip-hop DJs are not on here. Rest assured they will have their countdown somewhere in the future, most likely not by me for my unfamiliarity with a large amount of their. Anyway, Howlett’s selection is eclectic as shit, bridging the gaps from old school hip hop, punk rock, and garage house much like his work with the Prodigy. But its here that he displays his talents as orca straighter, running three tracks into each other at once, using acapella tracks from everyone from slick rick the beastie boys and even “Dreams of Santa Anna”. This album is fun, I should know I sharpen my B-Boy skills to it frequently.

Andy Gray: BT rare and remixed

Yes, yes all the material that Gray is spinning is BT, but he is spinning it. And he does a hell of a job picking the tracks and putting them together, tracking a rise and fall as well as a suitable climax to both sides. This is how greatest hits should sound, remixed and reworked to the point that its brand new. There are of course the BT staples “Blue Skies”, “Godspeed”, “Dreaming”, “Smartbomb”, and for some reason “Flaming June”. But while those tracks are great, what I love is the inclusion of BT’s remixes of Seal, his work with Paul Van Dyke, and of course his work with Sasha (not of KMFDM). A lot of the beats and production have too much of a sheen for my taste, and the emotion is a little to canned, but this isn’t Gray’s fault, who expertly sticks these tracks together and juxtaposes them so their flows meet and dovetail nicely. This might sound like no sweat, especially when you are spinning one artist’s work, but consider all the remixes are done by other artists. I am surprised how uniform he managed to make them all sound.