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DJ Name: DJ Pone
Hometown: Fairfield, CA native transplanted to Berkeley
Trademark saying or philosophy toward your music/your life:
Without revealing too much of my motivation and personal history
(which is mine, and mine alone, you nosey bastards), I like to
think I live by the maxim which is succinctly expressed by the
classic Latin saying “Carpe diem”. That’s some
old high school graduation sounding bullshit, but yeah. As read
in Macbeth To the last syllable of recorded time, And all our
yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out,
brief candle! Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player That
struts and frets his hour upon the stage, And then is heard no
more. Life’s too short to fuck around. I like to get out
and do shit, lest I rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Groups that you have been a member of: Canned Beats
(my original mobile DJ crew with DJs NeoGeo, Verge,
and Mars D); ’89 Skratch Gangstaz (my scratch
crew with Snayk Eyez); Dub FX (my reggae band);
TFS DJs (party/club DJ crew with DnZ, NeoGeo,
and Onedr Love); Hip Hop Slam (that one record label
I work for); DJs of Mass Destruction (with Billy Jam
& Dawgisht); The Backspin Boys (the internationally-acclaimed
turntablist boy band); the NoCal DJ & Music Production
Academy (the DJ school I teach at); The Skratch Pistolz
(you’ll soon see)
How would describe the music you spin? I like anything
recorded, although standard classification would probably call
me hip-hop. But what is hip-hop but every kind of music? I like
to go back to the stories where Bambaataa would flip anything
from classic soul to funk to Rolling Stones to a Josie & The
Pussycats record – and keep the crowd with him every step
of the way. I like to spin Ludacris and Barry Manilow and Brand
New Heavies and Green Day and 5th Dimension and Pete Rock and
Vince Guaraldi and everything else I like to listen to, which
is everything. Every kind of popular music in America stems from
a common blues source anyway. It’s the music industry and
corporate America that insists on classifying things and dividing
the people they only consider as consumers – I can link this
to a greater political overview, but I’ll get off the soapbox
now.
How would u describe yourself as a DJ? I would consider
myself as striving to be the Bay Area uber-DJ type (of which the
Triple Threat DJs are the epitome): one who can DJ weddings, but
also rock the club parties, but also have enough skills to battle,
and produce turntablist tracks. I am like water. Sometimes I flow
downstream, adapting myself to the dictates of the surrounding
environment. Sometimes I am cold and solid, breaking pipes and
freezing everything around me. Sometimes I am like vapor, light
and ethereal, making people sweat without anyone ever noticing
me. Damn, that sounded like some Kung Fu shit.
Discography: Turntablist tracks with 89 Skratch Gangstaz:
“Cut From Behind” on Turntables by the Bay
(Hip Hop Slam); “Lesson 89” on Return
of the DJ Volume IV (Bomb Hip Hop); “Lesson 3”
(Extra Credit Remix) on Global Turntables (Hip Hop
Slam); “Directors Cut” on Return of the DJ
Volume V (Bomb Hip Hop).
Recorded scratch appearances with Hip Hop Slam: Scratch Attack
1; Scratch Attack 2; Scratch Attack 3. Co-produced
with Hip Hop Slam: War (If It Feels Good, Do It!) with
DJs of Mass Destruction.
Official remixes produced with 89 Skratch Gangstaz: Remix of “Lesson
3” by Double Dee & Steinski (Tommy Boy);
remix of “DJ DJ” by Transplants (Epitaph
Records)
Official remixes: “Earthcrusher” by Mr. Lif
(Def Jux); “Son of a Bush” by Public
Enemy.
Mix CDs: Hits from the 90s with DJ Spair.
DJ Battle History (solo & team): (abridged) 1999
DMC US Regional Champion; 1999 DMC US Finalist
First record you ever bought: As a kid? Probably some
of those storybooks with 7” records from Golden Books
and Peter Pan Records (I still have some of them). With
actual music? K-solo’s “Fugitive”
or Gerardo’s “Rico Suave”. Lost the
“Rico Suave”; still have “Fugitive”.
Most influential record(s) in your life: “The Adventures
of Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel” by Grandmaster
Flash; “Bring the Noise” by Public Enemy;
Less Than Zero OST; Blue Haze by Miles Davis; Ultimate Beats &
Breaks Vol. 10; “Give it All You Got” by Afro Rican;
“Planet Rock (Bass in the Planet Remix)” by DJ Magic
Mike; Step into the Arena by Gangstarr; “So Whatcha Sayin”
by EPMD; “Ugly People Be Quiet” by Cash Money &
Marvelous
When did you first DJ? My first time to DJ in public was
sometime in 1992. It was probably some house party in someone’s
garage in good ol’ Fairfield; I can’t remember exactly.
What made you want to be a DJ? In contrast to the numerous
stories of many other DJs, listening to “Rockit”
was not my first experience hearing a DJ cut and mix it up. Rather,
my first experience hearing a hip-hop DJ is listening to “The
Adventures of Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel” back
around 1983 or 1984, featured as a track on some generic K-tel
compilation. The sublime import of that experience was not actualized
until about 1989, the year I really got into listening to hip-hop
music and music in general. My favorite parts of the record were
the parts where the DJs scratched – I especially enjoyed
DJ Scratch and DJ K La Boss of EPMD and DJ Magic
Mike, the king of Miami bass. I didn’t really think about
DJing myself until about 1991. My old high school friend Mike
just moved to Fairfield from Daly City – the city known for
its vibrant mobile DJ scene, of which Mike was a part of. He told
me stories about the legendary DJ Qbert, who was just beginning
to emerge on the national scene about that time. The stories of
Qbert, combined with my fascination with scratching, motivated
my desire to DJ. My sister’s ex boyfriend gave me his old
Pyramid mixer, and I got a Gemini belt-driven turntable,
and so began the actualization of DJ Pone.
What is your most memorable performance of your DJ career?
I will always cherish the memory of competing at the 1999 DMC
US Finals – for most battle DJs, getting to the DMC US Finals
is a major achievement. I’ll remember meeting one of my idols,
DJ Magic Mike, who was there watching that night. However, one
of my favorite performances took place at a rave I DJed in Chico,
CA a few years ago. While I was spinning, there was a little power
outage and the sound equipment turned off. I was stuck in front
of a crowd of hundreds, with no music. I felt the urge to sing
(which for people that know me, know that my urge to sing comes
quite often), and I sang the Tom Jones classic “It’s
Not Unusual.” I had the crowd clapping the beat, and
I got to finish the song, even as the power returned in the middle
of my song. In 2002, I played with my reggae band Dub FX
at the Reggae on the River festival. That must have been
the largest crowd I ever played for – tens of thousands,
all there to watch people like Burning Spear and the Marleys.
It was great to open up such reggae legends, at such a high profile
event.
How do you transport your records and/or gear to gigs?
Like every other working DJ, I put everything in cases, and lug
it along, most of the time by myself. I guess I just am not at
that level to have roadies yet.
Do you play CDs ever at gigs? Yes. I need a CD turntable
to scratch Bush samples for the DJs of Mass Destruction.
In your opinion, who is the best DJ of all time? Of course,
on the scratching end, it’s Qbert, probably the most
technically skilled scratcher of our time. The fact that he continued
learning and innovating after he won the DMC championship is amazing
to me, and sets him apart from many other DJs.
The best overall DJ of all time, in my opinion, would have to
be DJ Shortkut. He is the quintessential DJ – he has
world-class turntablist skills, has knowledge of a wide range
of music, from hip-hop to reggae to soul & funk to 80s to
disco, and he can mix with the best of them. No one else has as
broad a range of high-level DJ skills as Shortkut. He is an inspiration
to me.
Best website or way for folks to find out more about you?
www.djpone.com is my
personal website, but it’s more of a joke site. For updated
event information, check out my crew’s site, www.cannedbeats.com.
For the latest on my Hip Hop Slam production projects, of course
there is www.hiphopslam.com.
To find out more about the the hottest DJ school in the country
(where I teach scratching), check out www.norcaldjmpa.com.
And to find out more about my reggae band, Dub FX, check out www.dubfx.com
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