DJ AM Wonderwall Routine – Breakbeat Identified by DJ Dennis J
As many who know me personally undoubtedly know, I am a huge DJ AM fan. The man was a genius, and will be forever revered by many.
Along with many other DJ AM fans, I’ve been dying to find out where to get the breakbeat that he used on his infamous Wonderwall routine.
Well, I think I have figured it out! Many claimed it was a remixed version of Run DMC’s “Walk This Way” or a track on a DJ Rectangle record. Well, both are wrong. I believe the actual breakbeat used was hard to identify because it is created from two parts of a scratch sample record, which AM made his own breakbeat from.
Note: the actual breakbeat is 2 bars, yet I’ve only looped 1 bar for my demo. This is enough to tell you whether or not the breakbeat is the same.
At this time I’m not disclosing the origin because
1) I want to make sure this really is the track used. Please comment and tell me if you agree that this is the same breakbeat!
2) I want to see if anyone really cares enough to post something on their pages linking to this page.
Comment and let me know where you’ve linked and talked about this blog post, and if I see enough interest, I’ll disclose the origin!
New Years Eve at Masquerade in North Park (West Coast Tavern, 2895 University Avenue)
Client: Dave Soko from West Coast Club Life and Jon Block from Jon Block Presents
Venue: West Coast Tavern
Venue Address: 2895 University Avenue, San Diego, CA 92104
Number of guests: 1000+ (venue held 1300)
Services Provided: Club DJ, Master of Ceremonies, enhanced dance floor lighting.
A full writeup is coming soon, but for now I have gotten lots of requests to get a copy of the special New Years Countdown Mix that I dropped on New Years Eve at Masquerade. So, here’s the full mix. Enjoy!
Ruby and Antonio currently reside in Los Angeles, but chose to have their wedding at Candelas On The Bay in San Diego, to accommodate family members (and because San Diego is a great place for a wedding, of course!). Antonio is a successful hollywood actor, whose work includes television dramas, sitcoms, major motion pictures, theatre and voiceover work. The talent is not one-sided in this relationship, however, as Ruby is an accomplished graphic designer who excels at marketing promotion.
Antonio contacted us after being referred from a friend who had seen us perform at a wedding in San Diego. We met with him and Ruby and discussed a few details, and both of us left the meeting confident in the fact that together we were going to make their night magical. It helped that they were using Candelas, and we’ve been on Candelas preferred vendor list for a while now. One of their managers, Karen Houpt, worked with us at a previous wedding, and ever since then she is first to recommend us when any of her clients are in need of a DJ.
San Diego Wedding Venue Candelas On The Bay
When we met, Ruby was particularly interested in uplighting. She has been previously discouraged about extra lighting because Candelas has so much atmosphere lighting already, but had never been introduced to the concept of ‘underlighting’. I showed her some example pictures, and she was convinced. After some consideration, she decided to use aqua underlighting on the head table, gift table, and cake table. The end result was beautiful, and they received compliments not only from their guests, but even patrons of the restaurant came over to tell them how wonderful the underlighting effect was.
Cake Table Uplighting (Underlighting)
Head Table and Gift Table Uplighting (Underlighting)
Setup was smoother this time since we are now well-acquainted with the layout of Candelas. My assistant Jay Villaruel set up the dance floor lightshow, while I took care of the DJ system, and uplighting. It was an interesting arrangement, because the wedding was not private, and the restaurant was still open for business so the ‘dance floor area’ was full of tables and restaurant patrons eating meals. We set up quickly and then went to mingle. While dining was going on, several restaurant patrons inquired about our DJ system. We took opportunity to proudly show them the capabilities of Serato Scratchlive and demonstrate how Wedding DJing can still be done with vinyl to provide club DJ entertainment techniques to a wedding reception’s open dance segments.
Serato Demonstration by DJ Dennis J
The event did not start until the patrons in that area were finished and the tables were removed to create a dance floor for the wedding reception.
The Creative Music DJ set up at Candelas in Coronado
The reception went well. We started with toasts, and proceeded to first dance and a father daughter dance. For their first dance, they contracted us to develop a mix using several of their favorite songs, starting slow, moving to energetic, then back to slow. Interested in listening to it? Here it is!
Open dancing started with some salsa and cumbia, per the couple’s requests. Throughout the evening, we mixed back and forth from latin hits to current club hits. The interspersing was received well, and even restaurant patrons were chanting to some of the songs and having fun with the wedding guests.
open dancing with the bride and groom having fun
Guests of the wedding enjoying the dance floor
The dance floor stayed packed all night long, which is always what we strive for. Several guests came up and requested songs of both American and Latin, and we were happy to play many of the ones requested. After the event was over, the Ruby and Antonio thanked us several times, and were happy to pose for some memorable pictures.
Dennis J and Jay Villaruel with Antonio
Congratulations to Ruby and Antonio, and thanks to both of them for inviting us to be a part of their special night!
