US news

Simon Cowell’s ‘DJ Idol’ Not Happening, DJ Culture Breathes a Sigh of Relief

Darren Ressler Leave a Comment

Simon Cowell’s plan to create a DJ talent competition in the vein of American Idol in partnership with Sony Pictures plus Jada Pinkett-Smith and Will Smith’s Overbrook Entertainment have been shelved. According to the New York Post, egos seem to have been the stumbling block as Cowell fought Will and Jada Pinkett Smith’s company for top billing on the show’s credits. A rep for Syco confirmed to Page Six yesterday: “Syco and Overbrook decided not to proceed together on a DJ-competition show.”

“It’s not happening anymore because of Simon,” a source told the Post.

Another source added, “There were some deal points that couldn’t be worked out, and Sony and Overbrook walked away.”

Speaking about his excitement on working with the actress on the project earlier this year, Cowell said, “As soon as I met Jada and Miguel (her associate)… I knew they would be our ideal partners… DJs are the new rock stars. It feels like the right time to make this show.”

Having dodged a bullet, DJ culture now breathes a collective sigh of relief.

James Murphy Collaborating with Ron Howard

Darren Ressler Leave a Comment

James Murphy, of the now defunct LCD Soundsystem, has partnered with Canon for “Project Imaginat10n,” where he’ll pick ten consumer photos to inspire a short film he directs under the mentorship of Ron Howard. Jamie Foxx, Eva Longoria, Biz Stone and Georgina Chapman are also part of this endeavor.

Here’s how it works: Fan upload photos to imagination.usa.canon.com. Canon and Howard will then edit down the images withMurphy and each director will then choosing 10 photos to inspire their films.

In the video below filmed in Brooklyn, Murphy explains the story of his photos and what they mean to him – perhaps inspiring consumers to submit and be part of the process.

Obligatory press gush fro James Murphy: “I like to make things, it doesn’t matter what, so this project makes me really happy. My first camera was a Canon AE1-P that I saved up and bought myself in the 80s and I’ve been a Canon guy ever since. I now have about eight or nine Canon cameras, including a mint 1014XL-S super 8 sound camera that I’ve had modified for crystal sync! I’m excited to direct something narrative, and really looking forward to working with Ron Howard, learning as much as I can.”

Skrillex Inspires Muse to Go Dubstep, Collaborates with Kanye West

Darren Ressler Leave a Comment

It’s good to be Skrillex. In addition to raking in an estimated $15 million per year, but he’s also inspiring and continuing to collaborate with some of the biggest artists in the world.

Last week UK stadium rockers Muse unveiled “The 2nd Law: Unsustainable,” a dubstep song (see video below) they wrote for their upcoming album after catching one of Skrillex’s DJ sets.

“We went to see Skrillex in Camden around October,” drummer Dom Howard told NME. “We went, ‘Fuck, it’s so heavy,’ loved it. I was like a full metal gig, they had circles of death, people were moshing, I hadn’t seen a reaction like that to electronic music before. We took inspiration and came up with [the song] ‘The 2nd Law: Unsustainable.'”

Singer Matt Bellamy added: “The moshpit has moved from guitars and gone towards the laptop, so with that song we’re trying to see if we can challenge the laptop. We created something that was dubsteppy but we wanted to see if we could do it with real instruments. We wanted to ask, ‘Can rock bands compete with what these guys are doing?'”

According to The Daily Beast, Skrillex has collaborated with Kanye West. “I did some music with Kanye and from what I know, it’s actually going to be the first song on his new album.”

In 2011 Skrillex produced tracks on Korn‘s The Path of Totality, so there’s a good chance more collaborations are in the pipeline.

Image via Facebook

“Unsustainable” is the highly anticipated/dreaded/mythical Skrillex-inspired first track from Muse’s upcoming album, The 2nd Law. The album drops October 2nd.

Killer Miami DJ Gets Life Sentence

Darren Ressler Leave a Comment

Miami area DJ Juan Carlos Portieles has been convicted of First Degree Murder in the death of is 18-year old girlfriend Jaclyn Torrealba, who he was charged with killing in October 2009. A Miami-Dade county jury has given Portieles, 33, a life sentence with no chance of parole for killing Torrealba and then driving around for a day with her body in the front seat of his car. Portieles used the alias DJ Seasunz and played trance sets on Miami’s club scene. He had opened for acts such as The Crystal Method and Armin Van Buuren, and was on the bill for a Tiësto gig in Fort Lauderdale before his arrest. If an appeal is not successful, Portieles will die in prison.