The Ineluctable Modality of the Visible

DSC08432, originally uploaded by sevensixfive.

My apartment in college, c. 1998. A bunch of us are sitting around, drinking, playing video games, listening to music. A friend of mine goes over to the turntables and starts playing jungle records, most of the records are mine, and he's never heard them before, and although he's played 80s music at a local bar for a few months now, he doesn't know how to beatmatch. But that doesn't stop him from playing a brilliant set, smoothly fading between songs during the beatless breakdowns. After he's done, a few of us, who are more experienced, are like 'That was amazing, how the fuck did you do that?'

'Easy', he says, 'you just look for the part of the record where the reflections in the groove change, then you know you can mix it there.' 'But how did you know which records would go so well together?' 'Oh that's easy too, just look for records with the same color label.'

Related: Breakbeat Science: War at 33 1/3

Also: Don't Call Them Mashups