Where Does That Music Come From!?

It wasn't easy to find the music that DJ's were playing back in the day

After discovering how great dance music was and how inclusive the parties were, I ran into a little trouble. Where was this music coming from, who were the artists? When I was out and I’d hear an amazing tune, I’d run up to the DJ and ask ‘WHAT IS THIS SONG!?’. Sometimes they wouldn’t even tell me, that would be giving away their secret sauce, but other times they’d be more than happy to tell me, relishing in the fact that someone loved he tune as much as they did. I’d remember the tune and then during the week, I’d walk into a music store like Sanity and look for the song on CD single, it was never there. I’d ask the people working there only to be given completely blank stares. What the heck is Talla 2XLC, Yves Deruyter? Never heard of them. Occasionally I’d find some of the more commercial tunes from artists like Paul Van Dyk or Robert Miles but it was hard going in a small town like Canberra and no real connections. You just seemed to need to be in the know.

It wasn’t until an end of school function at The Private Bin, a legendary nightclub in Canberra, where I was dancing away to some commercial dance music and the DJ announced himself to the crowd; “I’m Chris Fresh and you’re listening to [insert whatever song was playing]”. My eyes lit up. I recognised that name from countless rave flyers and thought that this was my chance. I legged it to the DJ booth and barged my way in…  “You’re Chris Fresh!!”

“Yeah, that’s me. What’s up?”

“You play at all the rave parties that I’ve been going to!! WHERE DO YOU GET YOUR MUSIC FROM!?”

He went on to say that he got all his music from Landspeed Records, which at the time was upstairs in Garema place. I ended up staying in the DJ booth for ages watching and chatting. It was awesome and inspiring!

It took me a bit to find Landspeed, it was really tucked away, you’d have to go into an arcade and up some stairs to find it and when I entered I was greeted with a tiny little store with CD’s, T-Shirts, records and cassettes. I remember feeling super intimated by how cool the place was and was a bit scared to ask about some music. From memory, I plucked up some courage and asked and was directed to the records section. They didn’t have anything that I was looking for but I think I picked up a Daft Punk record. I don’t think I’d touched a record since I was about 7 playing with some of my Dad’s old Greek music so I was completely unsure what to do with it, so I just put it back down. I noticed someone listening to a record at the counter and thought that was super but my nerves got the better of me and I quickly got out of there.

I don’t think I bought my first record from Landspeed (I’m pretty sure that was from BPM records on Oxford Street in Sydney, Smack My Bitch Up by The Prodigy) but I definitely spent a small fortune at Landspeed, which is still in Garema Place, just downstairs in an easier to find location.

I built up a super random collection of tunes from big beat, trance, happy hardcore and house. I’d play them on my Dad’s old stereo, no way to mix tunes together but I’d sort out the records in order of how I’d play them. I’d start slow and eclectic and go on a journey and end up on big euphoric tunes, it was so much fun to imagine mixing them all together. It wasn’t until I bought Chris’s old CD mixer, a Denon DN-400F, that I could actually start prarticing.

I didn’t have a proper mixer, just an old amplifier, so I would quickly switch between the different inputs to try and beat match. It was challenging and I really wasn’t sure if it was quite on but it was a start and I bloody loved it. I’d go from commercial dance CD’s to underground trance tunes, it must have driven my parents crazy as I didn’t use headphones. I think it took a while for me to dive in and by a cheap American DJ 2 channel mixer and even longer for me to save up and by a Technics SL1200 turntable but nothing would stop me practicing, imagining the perfect set and playing to a crowd in my bedroom, it was so much fun and was only the beginning of my Dj journey.