DJ Ron's Dance Music Blog

Check out the Top 50 Club Chart for the the month of October as compiled from a panel of DJs around the US.

They say everything gets better with age, and DJing is no exception. I can remember the days of lugging around crates of records weighing 50 pounds each. Of course I was in better shape then. Nowadays, the older and wiser me carries an all-in-one system comprising of a laptop, a USB MIDI controller and a pair of headphones altogether weighing less than 10 pounds. Wonder how that's possible? Let me introduce you to the VCM-100 from Vestax.

How many dance divas does it take to cover this classic song from The Color Purple? The answer is three and for this club kid living in Nashville, Tennessee, great gospel music combined with house beats makes my heart (and soul) go boom. With everything going on in the world right now, maybe this is a message we all need to hear. Check out the video remixes here in the listening booth.

Translating electronic music to a live stage performance is quite a challenge. With their new CD In Silico, Pendulum have fused drum & bass with their punk and metal background to create music that works as well in a stadium show as it does on the dancefloor. With the insane energy of their live performances, Pendulum have been dubbed by many as The Prodigy of the new millennium bringing together the rock crowd and the club crowd.

Ten years ago, a cover version of Gary Wright's "Dreamweaver" introduced Erin Hamilton to the dance world. The daughter of comedienne Carol Burnett enjoyed a string of club hits including "The Flame," "Satisfied," and "The Temple" which all appeared on her CD "One World." After personal struggles with substance abuse and relationships led to an extended break from the music industry. With five years of sobriety and a new family, Erin is back again – having achieved back-to-back number one hits on the club chart "The Flame 08" and "Control Yourself."

The Stanton SCS.3d (aka Da Scratch) is a new piece of DJ gear that is getting a lot of prerelease buzz. Using touch sensitive controls (like the IPhone), DaScratch is operated by DJs with motions and gestures across several surfaces (5 slders and a rotary control.)

Canadian songstress Kreesha Turner follows up her breakthrough "Bounce With Me" with this motown feeling jam that is equal parts Duffy and Leona Lewis. With a sassy video and remixes by Morel, Bimbo Jones and Digital Dog, "Don't Call Me Baby" will be storming the clubs throughout the fall. Check out the video and remixes here in the listening booth.

I am a DJ in a medium-sized city and have a great local following. The club I spin at brings in resident DJs from time to time and I often wonder how they get on the circuit. Recently, the club brought in Seth Gold and the whole time I thought to myself, I can mix a a lot better than he can. What am I doing wrong?

The buzz last year at WMC for techies was the Tonium Pacemaker, a device which allows the user to beatmix two different tracks from the unit's hard drive. With the opening up of the IPhone to outside developers, it was only going to be a matter of days before a DJ product for iTunes would surface. One of the first out of the blocks is the Diddy DJ Lite. Although its usefulness is quite limited, it sets the standard for the use of an iPhone (or other phone-based device) to be used for DJing.