As the silly season and unbearable temperatures start to kick in at super speed, so does the temperature on our national dancefloors as the best of the best are imported to make our Summer period complete. This all kicks off this weekend with the beginning of the first events on the inthemix.05 tour, about to explode into nightclubs like the Hiroshima bomb as Tiga and our Prince of the disco – Ajax – man the decks. ITM’s Semone Maksimovic continues to get on the case to bring us all of the latest grand plans and stratagems from inside the camp, snaggling some time with the hard to pin-down Ajax on a hot and crazy Thursday afternoon to talk about the impending tour, inthemix.05 mix CD, and what 2006 has in stall for Sydney’s highest-rising DJ.
For most Australian punters, it’s unlikely that Ajax is in need of any introduction, you’ve most likely been exposed to a set of pure brilliance as he’s graced a stage in your hometown, own a mix cd or two of his in your collection or if you live in Sydney, you look to him at one of his regular residencies or on his FBi Thursday ‘Sunsets’ show for your weekly dose of musical education, cause if it’s new and it’s hot, he’s guaranteed to be the first one playing it.
2005 has been a year to end all years for this mastermind, as his star has continued to rise and rise, he’s climbed even further up the Technics inthemix50 chart; scored a plethora of regular shows across the nation, whilst still managing to keep up his usual 2-3 shows a night appearances back at home. He also released his second CD for Ministry of Sound, Mashed Vol 2 with the Bang Gang crew (followed by an extensive National tour). And now just as you think he could be in order for a bit of time out, he’s finishing up remixes, re-edits, getting packed and ready to take the road with his Canadian connection to celebrate the release of their inthemix.05 double cd mix.
“We were all trying to get it all together for a while and it was pretty difficult to do, because of the Mashed release and tour and then secondly because of Tiga’s time schedule -all you have to do is go to his website to see that he’s just been so jam-packed this year. But finally, with all of the heavy planning it’s all coming together and we’re excited.”
With the recent release of Bang Gang’s ‘Mashed’ and then his inthemix.05 mix due in such short succession, is this just a continuance of the Mashed mix or something completely different? The answer is of course the latter of the two, it’s fresh and changes direction from anything you may have heard on his past few mixes, something a little closer to what can be expected from his upcoming live sets, a deeper, more thought out mix, rather than working to a 100-tracks-in-100-minutes aesthetic.
“I didn’t want to do so much of a mash-up cd, because I’d just done that, I wanted to move away from that altogether. I just knew that I wanted it more camp – I mean that more in an Italio-disco way – so the first half of the mix definitely has more of a camp and fluffy element to it… corny, not cheesy,” laughs Ajax. “Then right in the middle of the disc it goes off a bit harder and then at the end, it goes a little more acid-house, so it’s more of a listening experience rather than just hectic from start to finish like a mashed mix. In the end I’m really happy with it cause Tiga’s is a lot more dark, big-room, where is mine is kinda like the backroom.”
“Usually I prefer to have a good couple of weeks to work on a mix, but this one I really only had about a week to squeeze it all in. So there were lots of late nights and no-doze keeping me awake to get it together in time. The thing about doing a mix and licensing and all that is that you could be halfway through your mix and a track could come through, then you’ve got to try and squeeze it in or start again. It can be a real dilemma, often it’s like doing a jigsaw puzzle and all of the pieces don’t fit, so you’ve got to make them squeeze into as best fit as possible, cause you’ve only got so many options,” he explains.
Taking the road with his old friend and Canadian ally Tiga is set to pop the cork on the summer season and all of it’s festivities, even though it’s unlikely anything else this summer has on offer could quite top this line-up. There isn’t anything he’s willing to divulge about what may happen on tour, other than the fact we can expect a whole lot of dancing and debauchery.
As for what’s around the corner for the prince of the decks next year? Well take your pick…he’s almost all booked-up already (surprise, surprise), with the national Big Day Out tour on the cards, followed by Good Vibrations. Then in May he’s set to head overseas to play in Europe and the US for the first time on a 2-month tour, before heading home for a brief 2 month stint and then leaving us again to do the trek to South America and Asia. “Apart from that I’ve got lots of remixing and production work coming up, it’s going to be a really massive year, so it’s good to do these mix cds now, because I’m probably not going to get a chance to do any of them next year,” he shares excitedly.
Don’t miss your chance to catch the electro elite while you can, on a whirlwind tour across the country to launch the inthemix.05 CD and magazine:
Thu Nov 17 – Ambar, Perth (Tiga & Ajax) [BUY TICKETS]
Fri Nov 18 – Metro, Melbourne (Tiga & Ajax) [BUY TICKETS]
Sat Nov 19 – Home, Sydney (Tiga & Ajax) [BUY TICKETS]
Sun Nov 20 – Mybar, Gold Coast (Tiga & Ajax) [BUY TICKETS]
Fri Nov 25 – Monastery, Brisbane (Ajax & Illya)
Sat Dec 3 – Garage Bar, Adelaide (Ajax only)
inthemix.05, mixed by Tiga and Ajax, is instores now – through Central Station/MRA (BUY NOW), and don’t forget to pick up a copy of the inthemix.05 annual magazine – available soon from the ITM Shop and newsagents.
For more info on inthemix.05 check out http://www.inthemix.com.au/05.
