I love mashups and I love mixes. The only thing I could possibly love more is a mix of mashups!

For those that don't know, a mashup is the mixing to two songs to intertwine. Like the music from one song mixed with the lyrics from another song. A mix is the blending of two songs into each other.

On the local radio station Indie 103.1 is a weekly show called The Smash Mix, which is a half hour long mix of mashups. DJ Paul Vhas been doing a great job for the last several weeks with the Smash Mix and keeping it entertaining. His mix on April 15th for Tax Day was brilliant.

The mix airs on Fridays at 5:30-6:00pm and repeats at 9:30-10:00pm on Indie 103.1. They have a good streaming feed, so even non-Angelenos can listen in. Personally, I record it weekly with my Griffin Radioshark.

The best place to find the mix is at CultureDeluxe under DJ Paul V. You can also find the mixes at FleetwoodMash, scroll down to DJ Paul V.

There is even a Smash Mix podcast feed at Alohadude.net, for those podcastingly inclined.

I wrote to DJ Paul and asked how he made the mixes, I assumed it was all produced in a digital audio workstation software package. It's not, it's mixed LIVE. Here's DJ Paul's reply:

I guess I should let people know this more: All Smash Mixes are made & mixed live - CD deck to CD deck (usually 4 decks tho). I'm not mixing them live on the air, but I pre-make them during the week.

But there's no audio software involved at all. I might take a stab trying Cool Edit soon, but I haven't even installed the program yet.

I kinda like that there's a live and real DJ element to the mixes, even if they could be perfected using software.

Ciao for now....PV

To me, this is the remix culture I love. Sure translating speeches into different languages via Creative Commons licenses is a cool idea, but it a bit dull compared to rocking out to tunes by a great DJ...

There are those that don't like Indie 103.1 because it's owned by Entravision and has ties to Clear Channel, but I love it. This is some real creativity and great radio pumping out on Indie.

If loving the Smash Mix on Indie 103.1 is wrong, I don't want to be right.

Posted by michael at May 02, 2005 06:01 AM