Late last year, young student and upcomming house DJ, Doug James, won the 2001 National Tertiary Electronic Music Competition. This was a nation-wide University competition. When ITM recieved the opportunity to interview Doug, who won the student category of the competition, there was no better candidate to talk to him than ITM contributor Will Balfour, winner of the non-student category of the same competition. Together both DJs are putting on a party at Sydney Uni Manning Bar, bringing them back to the place where they both won the competition.

Joint winners of the 2001 National Tertiary Electronic Music Competition, Will Balfour and Doug James, return to their home ground at Manning Bar Sydney Uni for a new funky house/breaks night appropriately named FUSION. It’s on February 15th with emerging breaks stars Defcon 1(Home), and Novocastrian Breaks supremo DJ Auxiliary(Nutshell Breaks), slicing up funky party winners in the main room with special guests on the balcony.

The inaugural National Tertiary Electronic Music Competition held late last year saw students from all over Australia battling it out for $1000 cash in exchange for twenty minutes of mixing. DJ competitions seem to be proliferating like odd socks but ‘National Champion’ is still is a great title and one label that up and coming house DJ Doug James is happy to wear. To get an idea of his musical evolution I asked Doug how he got into this thing we call House music.

“I was going out a lot and I guess it started with me thinking that it was just so much fun going out that I wanted to be able to program my own music. I liked the idea of giving others the same pleasure I was getting from DJ legends like Alex Taylor.”

When you started buying records did you have a clear idea of what is was that you wanted to do or did you just let it happen and see where you ended up?

I knew the music I liked but was seriously clueless about the technical aspects of Djing. It was all about playing really good tracks and having a constant development of energy throughout the set. It seemed to me that you should never have a drop in the energy level because it’s all about climax. This was the premise on which I based my original philosophy of DJ’ing, – the music should get harder, faster and more climactic! I now play a much more diverse range of music but the idea of the energy level culminating at the end of the set remains.


The first time I saw you play at the Sydney Uni DJ comp, you were playing Hard House, and at the recent National comp you were playing slower, funkier House, what’s the deal?

“I started going out in London in 1996 and that whole clubbing experience led me in the direction of more energetic styles of music. I started playing Hard House because I loved it and wanted people to peak and go off while I was DJ’ing, I wanted it to be the best moment of their entire lives, not background music while they were sipping a cocktail. I tend to play funky house more these days, it’s a natural progression, just slowing down a little. I still play funky stuff with quite a bit of energy and try to get a lot of lift out of the mixes. You can now play funky stuff on a main floor where you couldn’t have five years ago – I think that’s the direction things are going in at the moment, or maybe it’s just that I’m drinking a lot more and going out a lot less!”

What’s going on with the whole breaks thing in Sydney?

Well it just seems to be exploding. Twelve months ago the term ‘breaks’ scared me, I thought it was music you couldn’t dance to until I discovered just how funky it could be. The advent of Finger Lickin’ records has transformed the whole sound with some huge tunes. For me the revolution really began with the Criminal Element Orchestra remix of Put The Needle To the Record – it’s one huge track. Now I think a dash of breaks is the perfect condiment to some way funky house.

When was your fist gig in public?

I played at a house party of epic proportions shortly before being offered a slot playing Phoenix at the Exchange Hotel at 4am on Sunday morning which I did for a couple of months.

It seems as though you’ve managed to get yourself a steady amount of work in the last couple of years, whether you’ve been playing hard or funky, so what do you find is the best way of getting people to consider giving you a gig?

Well it’s all about going out a lot and befriending people and then convincing them that they should give you work.

Which is a time honoured tradition in any creative industry.

Absolutely, I’ve been very fortunate because I’ve come into work very easily. I’ve been lucky enough to have a lot of friends in the industry as a result of having gone out so much, people that I was friends with before I even started DJ’ing who gave me some very useful advice – thanks Baby Bear! It’s been very much a case of personal friendships rather than anything else! Those connections might get a foot in the door but you still have to come up with the goods. Everywhere I’ve played it’s gone down really well, and it’s often been quite different to what they’ve had in those venues in the past and it seems to have worked which has been really lucky.

So what would you say to all the bedroom bangers who find it really hard to get gigs, and complain about the lack of suitable slots opening up.

Keep trying and consider putting on your own small event. Eventually if you’re good enough someone will give you work. I’ve always been a great believer in not pushing yourself too hard on other people and not investing too heavily in DJ’ing as the only focus in life because there’s no job security and as a young DJ it’s not healthy to put yourself at the mercy of promoters. Unless you can maintain some level of artistic integrity by being able to walk away from a source of income when people start telling you what to do, it places you in a very difficult position where you compromise yourself in order to provide your employer with what they want which I think defeats the whole purpose of wanting to be a DJ in the first place, which is having fun.


Well, the whole concept behind “FUSION” is to have fun and blur the boundaries a little, as long as it’s funky!

“FUSION” ‘Where Breaks and House Collide’ Friday February 15th, Manning Bar, Sydney University, $10, $5 before 10pm