djleon.net

This is the page where you can learn about how I started mixing.

The year where it all began: 1986. I was in a local store doing some grocery shopping with my mum, passing by the music section and this music got me stopped by to look around. They are playing Pebbles “Girlfriend” mixing into When In Rome “The Promise”, and it was played on a CASSETTE TAPE! Back then CD is very rare and vinyl is not even found in my country. I was mersmerised by the mixing and wonder: how did they do that? I was naive then, didn’t even know what a vinyl or turntable is, but though seeing them on the cover of mixtapes. In the end, I bought the tape, my first mix-tape! A nonstop mix where one mix to another. Since then, “going-into-music-store” became part of my daily chores, that’s how serious it became.

During that era, the music stores here sell a kind of tapes with a heavy-duty plastic cover. It’s a kind of pirated tapes. I still have quite a number in my collections, will scan and put it up for show. I am wondering whether any of my website visitors ever bought those tapes. Good quality and I believe it originated from Indonesia, at first I thought it was from Middle East. They came in batches. In one shipment, there will be like 20-30 types of tapes, in different genres, and usually last for 2-3 weeks, then another new shipment came. Guess what I was looking after? No doubts… mix types. The first time I was checking the store, it burnt a BIG hole in my pocket. I think I bought 7-8 tapes, considering one is about $10. I didn’t have much money, I was young and innocent then. After securing my new catch, I flew home to listen right away. Tell you the truth, there’s one funny thing about me. When I listen to mixtapes, I don’t listen from the beginning to the end. This is what I do (I am still doing now!! oh god…), I will forward to the part where the mixing is and listen to that particular cross-over, then continue to forward to the next section. If you own the cassette player, you will curse: “What the %#$! are you doing!” I got the a lot back then.

I was particularly interested by mixtapes done by a particular DJ called “Adam Jagwani”. Any tapes with his name printed on, I will pay and bring home to suffer the cassette player. His mix is so smooth, too bad, I lost all his tapes now. It would be nice to have them back if given the chance. I remembered I brought them to Singapore when I was studying there, but didn’t bring back as I was too over-weight when I returned home. By the way, I mean my luggage, not me. I tried to search for this DJ in the net, but can’t find any news on him, probably he has retired or something. It would be great if I can email him to say how great he was 20 years ago. Doh!

Ok. Back to the part where I bought my mixtapes. At first, I thought I have found the Holy Grail, but not until I stumbled into something more furious: the MEGAMIX tapes. I was jaw dropped when I first listened to one. Giving me more stars on my head and the same question: how did they do that, but is this possible? Those megamixes are done by DMC. Once I checked thru their back catalogues, I spotted some familiar tracklistings that I have heard, and dated me back to those plastic cover tapes (although the tapes didn’t mention DMC on the cover, as you know, pirated stuff tends to design their own covers with titles like “Ultimate 89 Megamix”, Best Disco 88 Mix”, bla bla bla…). My new mission: to collect Megamix tapes! To burn Bigger holes in my pockets!

to be continued…