Over the years, Erol Alkan must have blasted out tens, if not hundreds, of thousands, of 7" remixes, 12" extended versions, CD singles, classics of pop, electro, indie, rare LP tracks, one-off white labels, bootlegs, cassettes – well, not cassettes… – during his still phenomenally well-received DJ sets. But if they’re all about splicing together snippets of anything from a matter of seconds to ten minutes into a coherent whole to make a room move (and move they do), what exactly does the North London DJ, label boss, producer and remixer do when it comes to sitting at home packing those massive-selling EROL Keeps Kids Dancing t-shirts for the postman? How does a man who deals with mastering the moment approach the long player?
A halfway house can be seen in his new Another Bugged Out Mix/Another Bugged In Selection mix CD, out on Monday (details here and at Erol’s website). But the biggest revealer is Erol’s Baker’s Dozen, which gives clues as to the evolution of his musical taste, from DJ at London’s indie clubs in the late 90s (Manics), to experimental pop (KLF), glorious genre-crossing (New Order), pure, glistening pop (Duran Duran) and the criminally underrated (Campag Velocet). Click the picture below to begin the countdown.
