Launch Control: Atlanta, we’re set to blast off. All systems are ready to go.
In the Sound Table, the people stand on pins and needles. An anticipatory buzz ignites the air aflame.
Time: T minus 3 minutes.
Launch Control (LC): KAI, Technics 1200 right arm has needle.
KAI: Attached.
LC: KAI, Technics 1200 left arm has needle.
KAI: Attached.
LC: Pioneer CDJ 1 tray press open.
KAI: Open.
LC: Pioneer CDJ 2 tray press open.
KAI: Open.
LC: KAI, vent 1 speaker control power on.
KAI: Power on.
LC: KAI, vent 2 speaker control power on.
KAI: Power on.
LC: the Sound Table reports spacecraft is go.
Mission Director: Karizma Kaytronic is go.
LC: the ST – FTS bat one and two heater controls heaters off.
the ST: Off.
LC: Karl Injex, pressurized first stage LOX tanks to relief.
Karl Injex: Pressurized.
LC: Karl Injex, top first stage LOX to 100 percent levels.
Karl Injex: Up and down, 100 percent.
Time: Ninety seconds.
LC: KAI, hydraulic external power on.
KAI: Power on.
Time: Eighty seconds.
LC: RCO, report range go for launch.
Range Control Officer (RCO): Range go for launch.
Mission Director: LC (Viera), you’re go for launch.
LC: Roger.
Time: Seventy seconds.
Atlanta’s acclaimed DJ/producer/remixer Kai Alce proclaimed, “Its A New Day.” The mantra interwoven through a soundscape of current mid-tempo grooves ends in the record crates of vintage house music sounds. It’s been noted the NDATL label owner has been on an old-skool house music tip lately and his followers are all smiley faces. Mr. Alce slices and dices mellifluous beats that drive happy feet mad to the restaurant floor to dance between dining tables and around seating guests. Warm cheers serenade the cozy environment that patronize dining companions munching on the last bites of oxtail tacos while clicking cocktail glasses of Blackfoot Confederacy atop candle lit tables. Finally, after an eternity, the full bellies abandon their stations as the wooden oblong dining tables are evacuated onto the outdoors back patio or stationed alongside an exposed brick wall. The transformation from delectable eatery to decadent dance club signals the countdown to……..
Time: Fifty seconds
After Kai wraps up an astonishing set the party’s way over due special guest DJ, Karizma steps foot into the DJ booth. Ready. Set…….
Launch Control: We interrupt this blog to bring you a very important announcement. T minus to launch off is approximately thirty seconds. The ATLANTA WEEKENDer, Afrique Electrique or Distinctive cannot and will not be held responsible for what will take place to your body, mind and soul. Please, prepare to be possessed by strange rhythms that will descend upon you like bolts of lightning. Your life will never be the same. As a matter-of-fact, within the coming week you will experience severe withdrawals from the seismic shift that will take place. Brace yourself. Get ready for the ride of your life. You are about to launch off on Space Shuttle K2. AKA Space Shuttle Karizma Kaytronik. Your destination and mission: To seek out uncharted rhythms and to dance on unexplored worlds.
LC: T minus 10 seconds, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1,
LIFT OFF!!!
For anyone’s guess what occurs next could not be possibly conceived or imagined. All it takes is for one switch of a button to launch the party’s booster rockets into space that sends the shuttles red glare bursting into the air. The travelers packed into the thin vessel stand frozen-in animated positions with stunned visages-completely suspended in space and time until…….a jolt is felt. A thump is heard…… that signals the arrival of some unknown orchestrated philharmonic ready to pounce on the heads of the people. Split between several seconds, calmness gives way to chaos. Quiet anticipation gives way to boisterous recollection. A whirlwind of activity electro charges the atmosphere as Karizma Kaytronic presses play and sends the room into static shock. The environment is shocked with piceous particles ready to manifest in ectopic explosions. A seismic shift occurs. The travelers don’t expect such force. Nor have they experienced such blithe. Suddenly, people’s feet seem to detach off the floor, somehow able to defy gravity. Strange rhythms pulsating from several speakers command the floating bodies to dance in mid-air. The moonwalk has nothing on this. With force, the sacred grooves possess every soul within sight. The strange rhythm slam bodies against walls, drops bodies to the floor, and makes bodies roll on the floor. One individual even wants to scale up a wall. One being that vibrates violently, runs around in circles and dances as if overtaken by a secular ghost. Clothes fall apart. How can they not? A left suspender strap hangs loose. A red hat falls off one dancer’s head, flies several feet in the air and lands somewhere on the other side of the ship. Not one body or article is safe from this spatial anomaly.
Let’s back-up. Just who and what is this strange phenomenon called a Karizma Kaytronik? Perhaps a look into the house music’s history logs can provide additional insight. Karizma Kaytronik hails from Baltimore, Maryland USA, the city better known for its crime-ridden statistics and cable television police drama than its music. Every so often a life force shows up bearing talented gifts. His name happens to be Kris Klayton. Over time, Kris’ government name became Karizma the stage persona that won the world over with unmatched DJ skills and signature productions crafted under several monikers. To explore the mind of Karizma his name must be defined. Charisma is a gift of power that is divinely bestowed upon an individual. The power that Karizma possesses when he plays music is unequal to any rival. Some DJs can play music. Then there are DJs that can actually PLAY music. The latter are the anointed ministers of music (hence Karizma’s brother in rhythm DJ Spen) where Karizma Kaytronic falls. The in-demand DJ/producer/remixer doesn’t cue a CD and press play or cue some laptop software and press enter, he takes a beat and pulls an a cappella out of his a$$ and creates spontaneous smash-ups. These live remixes rock the global community of house mongers from the US to Croatia. To create spontaneous remixes is no wee task as a veteran goes through mind boggling hours and years of practice to pull off such a craft.
So what’s the fuss? It all starts with the Freddie Hubbard, “Little Sunshine” interpolation, sampled by the likes of Pepe Braddock, Trackheadz, Jask and DJ Spen, that explodes in the ear drums of the listeners. Several seconds later, an, “Heeyyyy,” “Ohhhhh” resonates and commands its place on board the ship. The unexpected yet surprising vocals cause rapture. Look up in the air, it’s a meteor, it’s an unidentified flying object, no it is songbird Jill Scott’s, “Golden” flying to the rescue that makes this supernatural smash-up the journey’s soundtrack. Stop! Someone’s heart just exploded.
On one hand, Karizma is a humble gent with a clever persona when in conversation. However, once behind the musical controls, out comes the world revered DJ’s other personality. Kaytronic, Karizma’s alter-ego, takes over the ship’s music controls and flies the people at warp speeds to uncharted territories.
Kaytronik’s first stop transports the travelers to the realm of Planet Old-School where time travels backwards and forwards simultaneously. The recently re-edit old-school anthem of Rufus & Chaka Kahn’s, “Live In Me” remixed by Karizma’s brother in rhythm DJ Spen, commands the star power that keeps the crowd zoned out in euphoric mental states. Time continues its retrograde as BT Express’, “Peace Pipe” the 1970’s war protest anthem has the crowd “smoke it on up.” Another house music classic from yesteryear recently interpreted for the current year, Kerri Chandler’s, “Rain” (Atjazz Mix) keeps the crowd all buzzed dancing animatedly in mid-air; as GQ, “Disco Nights”-the song that most DJs are playing as of late-warps minds back to a time of swinging bell bottoms and dancing platform shoes. However, it is Saint Germain’s, “Rose Rouge” from the year 2000 that takes the exploration to new heights. On the time lapse planet, writhed bodies fall to the ground, roll on the floor, and cause substantial damage to anyone standing in their way. Minds become twisted with strange debacles. This 2000 space odyssey loses all control and goes mad.
Once again the lodestar, with a press of a button, vaporizes the travelers into thin air where their bodies land on another unknown surface. There are certain DJs that can unleash the BEAST. Not all DJs, honestly not that many, can awaken the slumber of the beast. Every so often, perhaps every blue moon, the beast is unleashed that strikes. To witness its attack is bar none. Shhhh. Quietly the dancers watch their every move on this ramshackle planet that resembles an apocalyptic scene straight from a nightmare. Hold on just for one minute. In the distance, there appear several frightening beast-like forms that resemble dead zombies from a certain iconic music video. A closer inspection reveals their ghastly movements interpret the dance moves danced in that certain iconic music video. In the background the shouts of trumpets blast to the forefront of the mind. It is the opening sequence to Black Motion’s interpretation of Michael Jackson’s opus, “Thriller” (Mortarfied Remix) the bootleg with that afro-house beat that has the monsters dancing. Quickly the travelers join suit and dance with the otherworldly beasts with smiles on their faces. All is well on this planet. Truth be told, music is the universal language.
The dancers beam back on board Shuttle K2, and are fixated on French-ster Rocco featuring C. Robert Walker on vocals with, “I Love The Night” (Louie Vega Roots Mix). In the DJ booth, Kaytronik doesn’t play around, nor does he expect the dancers to play around on the dance floor. His music comes off boisterous but not pretentious. The beats play hard, not fair. Karizma is no joke. Nor is he for the ballerina types that prance to fingers that snap softly at 120 beats per minute or below. Folks, this IS your father’s house music. That Baltimore, Chicago, and Detroit shit that pioneered house music’s movement in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s, a time when the beats were allowed to be pitched up, or jacked up to its fullest furor to deliver seismic jolts to the heart. So if you like to play patty cake beats then get out of the cockpit because things are bound to get HOT!
More homage to Rufus & Chaka Kahn is paid with “I Know You, I Live You” that comes to an abrupt stop in mid-song. From the mouth of one disgruntle traveler spews four letter obscenities that hurls toward the DJ booth. However, all is well as the next song starts that has the once cursing traveler now singing, “Tell Me/Would You Like/If The DJ/Brought It Back” at the top of her lungs with a smile on face. The broken beat music segues into A Tribe Called Quest’s, “Award Tour” as the travelers scream in holy panic. Additional old-school hip hop rounds out the trip that makes for a safe return to the Sound Table.
WEEKENDer Epilogue
The Sound Table’s lights come on. One glance around the space reveals dishevelment. What happened? You question where you had gone? You check your watch to find three hours has passed. Really?!? Had that much time lapsed? For what was three hours seems like a mere three minutes. Had you really been gone that long?
Later that morning, at your Studio Suite at the W Hotel (downtown) after a bit of sleep and slumber you find that your passport has been mysteriously stamped with a K2 Shuttle Mission ensignia. Now that’s golden!!!
Words & Photography by AJ Dance
Share this:
Tags: Atlanta, ATLANTA WEEKENDer, deep house music, house music, Kai Alce, Karizma Kaytronik