Review – DJ Methodikal

March 2, 2006 D. H. McKee

Off

OK, I’m on a bit of a rant here. So be warned.
I was just listening to some of DJ Methodikal’s work. His website is here at (http://www.methodikal.com), and he offers some drum loops and Adobe audition files for download. Some pics, and a promotional video. The usual stuff. And he’s got a link to a store where you can buy his music.
Musically? He’s OK. Nothing particularly innovative, to be sure, though I was only able to listen to a single MP3 in his musicSUBMIT file, “swept away (The Malcom Young edit)”. Some hypnotic breakbeats, mostly looped drumbeats, stuff you can make on your computer, using Cool Edit. I’ll bet he’s using Cool Edit, or something. He appears to know how to put music together in a way that’s acceptable and appealing. I’d sure like to hear his other stuff. But I’m not going to download any illegally, and I’m not going out to buy any just yet.
I’m not sure why Methodikal’s ranting about people downloading his MP3s without paying for them, especially when his rant is a little hypocritical — he points out how many MP3s are on his own machine. At least he recognizes that, and makes fun of himself:
“so i was in the midst of an eight-hour tantric orgasm when i realized – my mp3 karma is alright, thank you very much. because my own mp3s are downloaded thousands of times a month while my “record sales” are in a bit of a “slump”. damn you china! damn you bittorrent! damn my own damn self for giving the milk away for free! if those thousands of downloads were going at iTunes prices, my pockets might be a grand a month deeper than they are now. but they ain’t…so who’s got the new otto record for me?”
Sure enough, one way to make yourself known out there on the Interweb is to get your music out there. If people are downloading it, your name (as long as it’s somewhere on the ID3 tags) is getting around. However, if you really want to get your music and your name known, make sure the reviewers have copies of your music so they can listen to it. An electronic press kit with some full MP3s will get you out there and will encourage reviewers to look at you seriously.
I looked around on his website, and there doesn’t appear to be any links to samples of his music. Not even a fragment of a song on embedded Real Audio (not that I would ever suggest any kind of streaming embedded music on a website — yeesh). So, the only link to any kind of music is the one that came on the musicSUBMIT email.
So that’s the kind of review you get. Terse.

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As a guy who occasionally curates art shows and wrangles artists together, I often have to edit and post artist bios, profile pictures, and artwork images. This can be a problem, since many artists and writers aren’t used to selling themselves. Artists rarely know how to present their art for display in a brochure, and writers aren’t used to writing about themselves.

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