2005 was one of hardcore’s biggest years to date, and 2006 looks to be just as big, if not bigger. Just ask the likes of Scott Brown, Dougal, Styles, Breeze or even Hixxy, they’ll tell ya! The parties are getting bigger, the productions are getting even better and the record sales are going ballistic!
“The events have just gotten bigger and bigger and the records are selling great,” confirms Hixxy. “We’ve had a couple of really big albums out as well which have just sort of smashed the boundaries of sounds. We’ve done one with Styles and Breeze called ‘Clubland X-Treme Hardcore’ which has sort of done over 120 thousand units in the U.K now so we are proper well chuffed with that. It’s just blown up massively,” says Hixxy of the album. “We done it with Universal Records, and its just been a great success. And Bonkers is still going strong which is on the same sort a tip. There’s me, Scott Brown, Sharkey and Dougal mixing it and that still does really well so it’s all going great guns at the moment!”
Hixxy’s Raverbaby label – although still recovering a little from the demise of its distributor, Alphamagic – has also been hitting some home runs of late, especially now with the label releasing its tunes through new distributor Amato. “Well we haven’t actually had loads of releases flowing out of Raverbaby,” adds Hixxy. “I’m still licking my wounds a little bit from Alphamagic – our old distributor – going under. But what an amazing company,” continues Hixxy, on new distributor Amato. “Its unbelievable going from what I thought was normal to actually going to a normal company. Everything from my first record that I put out in 93/94, the distributors we used were fucken awful, they all worked the same way. And now we’ve gone through Amato and I’m just sorta sat there and I’ve just been shaking my head in disbelief at how it should be done. And that’s probably why they’re still in the game and none of the others are.”
Before the days of the big distributors Hixxy tells me that it was all a little cloak and dagger like as far as getting the latest records was concerned. “When I used to go out and buy records, you used to go into a little underground store and a bloke would turn up in a van, bring em into the store and you’d pick off what you wanted out of white labels and this, that and the other, and there was a little bit of this and a little bit of that. I think from a scene that started off with a lot of people doing it cause it was their love and wanting to get it out there, its now turned into a business, which I don’t think is a bad thing because it’s a lot easier to get hold of the product you want now.”
One of the big names that you’re gonna be hearing a lot of in hardcore circles in the future is the likes of Recon, who coincidentally is also on the Oz tour this time around. He’s produced a couple of absolute stormers as I’m informed. “Yeah he’s definitely done the damage,” confirms Hixxy. “He’s definitely smashed out a couple of really big tracks. He’s done a massive remix of Ferry Corsten’s Cry, which is probably one of the biggest tunes over here at the moment. It’s just absolutely blown up. Actually,” continues Hixxy. “He’s coming to Melbourne with me, Darren Styles, Breeze, MC Storm and Whizzkid.”
As to what Hixxy himself has been up to of late production-wise, well there’s quite lot I’m told. “Yeah, there’s loads,” he says. “I’ve been doing a lot of trancey stuff under other names which have gone out on everything from Ministry Of Sound to Data, All Around The World and all sorts. Then hardcore wise,” continues Hixxy. “I suppose some of the remixes I’ve done recently have been N-Trance ‘Forever’ and I’ve done a Special D remix of ‘Come With Me’ which is quite a cheesy track, but man – it goes off! It absolutely goes off! I don’t know how I done that,” he laughs. “I’ve done a Brooklyn Bounce remix of Bass Beats & Melody, which I’d done previously before, and which was a little bit more naughty, but then because I wanted it on the Clubland album we went through the right channels and I ended up doing an official remix of it.”
As to what he has in store for us all this time around, apparently it all depends on who is playing before him, but either way we can all expect plenty of party tunes and anthems. “It’s mad right! Wherever I’m DJing I could start on hard trance and then build into quite full-on hardcore, or I could start off quite hardcore and build it up. I still play quite anthemy … I love an instant crowd reaction to be honest with you,” admits Hixxy. “I’m not one to say I want to get into a groove … I like to get em at it, you know what I mean. I do like to progress the ‘getting em at it’ though – I don’t wanna go blam straight up on a high. I do like to sort of take em up and down. But expect quite an obvious party set really … its what I’m sorta known for, its what I’ve always been known for, playing stuff that is quite partyish. And I’ll also be dropping some new bits … I’ve got a whole new arsenal of tunes to let loose.”
You can catch DJ Hixxy alongside the rest of the UK Raverbaby crew, continuing their tour around of Australia:
Fri 17th Feb – Melbourne
Sat 18th Feb – Sydney
Thu 23rd Feb – Adelaide
Fri 24th Feb – Perth
Sat 25th Feb – Brisbane
