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I started DJ’ing after a road trip with my family to visit some extended family in San Jose.  I was around 12 or 13 at the time I think.  They weren’t professional DJs but knew the basics of DJ’ing.  I was surprised at how simple the concept of transitioning from one song to the next was.

I saved money and bought my equipment.  Then came my vinyl collection.  Then came the hundreds of CD-Rs I needed to make to play the newer stuff and/or rare stuff.

I didn’t know it then but I know it now.  I was part of the last generation of DJs that were hired because of the record library they had.  To put it in perspective, anyone can be a DJ with a limitless library of MP3s now.  You specifically hired a DJ because you trusted his/her limitations in music.  

It was an absolute honor to build a clientele strictly from referrals.  To this day, I don’t really like to DJ for strangers unless they’ve heard me perform somewhere.  

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(Bryan Black tattooing my leg in 2012)

It reminds me of a conversation I’ve had multiple times with my friend, Bryan Black.  A tattoo should be a collaboration between the tattoo artist and the client.  A client shouldn’t be forcing their vision of the tattoo while disregarding the artist’s advice.  I feel the same exact way with my DJ clients.

All Bryan and I want for our clients are for them to trust us.  

That trust is usually rewarded with something special, memorable, and most importantly, organic.  

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A post shared by ej (@sandok_) on Apr 27, 2018 at 3:22pm PDT

(Skratching to Leon Bridges in my classroom in 2018)

I’ve been thinking about how I define myself as a DJ in 2020.  Yes, by default, I’m a Hip Hop DJ.  

However, I’m not really sure where Hip Hop stands today.  I think the “good” Hip Hop sampling era died somewhere along where Kanye’s music started getting overtly self-centered and simply not good.

With the music industry changing drastically because of the internet, it’s probably really easy to find a talented rapper.  Hell, I’m friends with some of the best emcees I’ve ever heard.

But what next?  How do you market them to people on the internet?  How do they make a career out of it?  How do you connect them to producers so they can reach their potential?

That’s why I think the next stage of Hip Hop is centered around artists like Bryson Tiller, SiR, and Frank Ocean.  

Simply put: you have to be able to showcase some musicality that isn’t necessarily based on rhymes and sampling.

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(Toby, my munchkin cat, posing in front of some the most talented female R&B artists of the century)

Which brings me back to why last night was so special.  I’ve been so stuck on the above mentality for a very long time knowing I’ve been bored of new Hip Hop for a while.

Nevertheless, I get really excited about really good R&B.  And the 21st-Century has definitely been providing.  SZA, H.E.R., Jorja Smith, Lana Del Rey, Snoh Aalegra, Summer Walker, and Jhene Aiko to name a few.

I’d like to think I’m good at spinning that stuff because there’s an intimate feeling with their music that I’d like to share with the listener.

Nevertheless, where does that leave me in 2020 as a “Hip Hop DJ?”  Especially since I tried my hardest to have my roots grounded in the culture.  I learned how to DJ breaks from Dwenz and the Foundation FunKollective, an incredibly influential figure and organization in the Los Angeles Hip Hop community.  Did I abandon hip hop in the 2010/2020s?

Hell nah.

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My first DJ mentor, DJ Redline, dropped in the set around 8:30 PM.  My sister had some classes with him at CSUF and he took me record shopping when I was in 7th/8th grade.  He let me in on all the DJ secrets with buying records, mixing, skratching, etc.  He even gave me a BUNCH of records which gave me a sense of pride knowing during those times DJs are what their records are.  I didn’t have anything.

Anyway, I decided to drop a LA Symphony track knowing we’re both big fans of them.  

Damn.  That was the catalyst that brought out a BUNCH of memories.

That was one of my favorite 12″ vinyl that I loved showing off back in the day.

I definitely feel spoiled that I have the MP3 and can play it whenever I want.

But, I don’t play it.  At all.

lordnik0n_ was the first to be stoked about the LA Symphony drop.

I later found out he’s the father of a former student.

That student used to tell me his family listens to my recorded mixtapes all the time.

Little did I know that he’s been tuning in to my quarantine series.

The night progressed into a HEAVY esoteric hip hop set that probably lordnik0n_, Redline, and I knew.  

Peep the set here.  It starts around 1:43:00

As a DJ, your job is to play for your crowd, my crowd was two people last night even though there were more watching.

I never get to play any of this stuff.  It was important to me to get a recording of it so I could listen to it later.

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Last night was special because it brought my journey as a DJ full circle.

I grew up knowing there are really talented Filipino DJs before actually learning the fundamentals.

I learned the fundamentals through imitating radio station DJs (Icy Ice, Melo-D, E-Man, etc.) and other DJ Crews (Invisbl Skratch Piklz, The Beat Junkies, The 5th Platoon, etc.)

I immersed myself in Hip Hop culture by participating in B-Boy events as a DJ and building a record collection.

I built a clientele that trusted my taste in Hip Hop, R&B, Funk, Soul, Rock, etc.

I heavily incorporate my love and appreciation of music and culture into my English Language Arts classroom.

I was welcomed as a resident DJ at Mesa which started a shift in the music they were providing for their guests

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It’s really hard to describe last night because I was thinking about all those bullet points simultaneously and reflecting where we are during this weird-ass quarantine lockdown.

But something really special happened when I was playing MP3s that I have as vinyl.  All those memories of when I was young, naive, and wide-eyed about the world came flooding back to me.  

All those memories came back and I was able to organically rock a hip hop set as if it were 2004 all over again.

All those memories made me realize that I haven’t really changed much.  My shift in music taste doesn’t necessarily mean I’m abandoning my Hip Hop roots.  It shows that I’m still hungry and wide-eyed about the world and want music to continue to give me the happiness it’s always provided me.

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(Rampage, High School Sandōk, Sunnynblue circa 2005)

I wish I had more pictures of when I first started DJ’ing.  I think I was insecure because I didn’t want the label of “Bedroom DJ” because I wanted to be something much more.

Kind of ironic now that I’m DJ’ing in my living room for y’all.  HAHAH

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A huge thank you to everyone that has been influential in my life.  That includes my clients, friends, family, and random people that enjoy my music at a bar/club/twitch stream.