The follow-up single from Lindsay Lohan's third studio album, Spirit in the Dark, will be the Pharrell produced "Playground," premiering on KIIS-FM on September 30th.
I, for one, am rather excited.
Hello, lovers! Just got back from Mohegan Sun about a few hours ago. I was horrified when, after scouring the gossip sections a bit after getting home, I found a picture of Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson giggling it up together over at the MGM Grand at Foxwoods Casino last night. You know, the only other casino in Connecticut. Come on ladies, get it together...I WAS RIGHT THERE!
I'm furious.
But all is not lost, as I made a fantastic discovery last night at the casino's CD shop that could alleviate most worldly wounds in our lifetime--This of course being the limited edition The Journey: The Very Best of Donna Summer greatest hits package! Delivered in a delicious purple box with a nice ribbon wrapping, the autobiography/greatest hits combo deal was on display for a measly $19.99! With a squeal and a giddy-up in the step, I snatched up this little jewel of disco's finest, which will be proudly displayed at my abode in the coming year. Yes, proudly, register woman. Oh, trust me, I know what you were thinking with those questionable eyes...And I don't care for it one bit.
By the way, the new Khia album, Nasti Muzik, is the soundtrack to my life. "Y'all ho's can't do it like me..."
Haven't done a proper perusal of the peripheral in a while (tee hee), so let us embark on a musical journey of sorts, shall we? To the right, the first image that caught my eye when Google Image searching for "scraps." And go!
ArjanWrites has some particularly luscious electro-pop brewing lately with the introducion of some new tunage from Electric Valentine, The Ultrasonics, and Neon Hitch! Head over to stream the new tracks now!
Raj of Electroqueer's got a sizzling review of Sam Sparro and Annie's performances at the iTunes Festival in London.
My friend Steve over at XOLondon has written up a fantastic interview with one of my favorite male pop stars, Darren Hayes. It's incisive, entertaining, and rather comprehensive. An excellent example of "smart pop" at its finest, if you will. Please check that out at once!
The ever quirky It's The Money Shot! has a nice amassment of links and news bites covering the past week. Which, now that I think of it, is a better version of what I'm doing right now. Check out his stuff! PS: Did you know he draws those pictures he includes in every entry? I know, right?!
HardCandyMusic's always seems to have the latest music first. Head over and check out what appears to be the first promotional remix of Lindsay Lohan's promo single, "Bossy." It's an absolutely vital warm synth repackaging of the original: Bigger bass, flashier lights! Literally, give it two seconds...you'll be sold. Make sure to keep your eyes open for the Mike Rizzo mix as well according to Mike himself, which should be cropping up sometime soon!
D'Luv of Chart Rigger keeps going on about people who suck.
PopMuse is keeping the mixes spinning on and on, even though I'm still not over his fantastic Disco Globes 2008 compilation!
In case you haven't heard, Mike Rizzo is returning to the dancefloor. After taking some personal time off, the popular DJ is now more than ready to launch back into dance scene, onto the mixing board, and on top of the charts once more.
His return kicked off nicely with a remix of Justin Timberlake and Beyonce's duet on "Until The End Of Time," and has since steadily gone upward with his smash hit mixes of Danity Kane's "Damaged" and Britney's "Break The Ice," all of which have performed quite well on the Billboard dance charts.
Last week, I had the pleasure to talk to Mike over the phone. He's a really funny guy with great work ethic, and it was a pleasure to speak to him and learn more about his life, his work, and his goals for the future. Go ahead and read on to check out what he has in store for 2008 including remix plans for Lindsay Lohan, Usher, live radio shows, and more!
Hey Mike, thank you for calling!
No problem!
So, let's get started. I see that you grew up in New York City and that it was in the early 90's that you got your start?
Actually, I grew up in New Jersey. I'm still a New Jersey native; I just work out of New York.
Ooh. The Internet lies.
Yeah, grew up in Lyndhurst NJ, now residing in Clifton, NJ.
I see, okay.
Once I'm done working for the night, I need to retreat back to the tiny, quiet neighborhood [laughs]. It gets too busy to be in New York.
[Laughs] I completely understand.
Yeah, I gotta just go and relax.
How did you break into the industry in the beginning?
Well, DJ-wise or production wise?
I'm talking about DJing.
Well DJing, I just followed a couple people years ago at weddings and proms and stuff and I was just always intrigued by how they would take the crowd and just move them. Take them in the palms of their hands; take them on a musical journey. That's what got me started…I was a very young guy.
So you slowly moved up into the clubs and started mixing there?
Yeah actually, I got a break. Frequented teen club back in New Jersey, Trendsetters, way back 20 years ago without giving my age away [laughs]. I would just hang out there in the DJ booth and watch this guy spin. I had his number and we could correspond back and forth. One day he said he couldn't make it, he got sick, and I did a two hour set and it went over very, very well. They asked me back to do my own night, so I kind of got started back in the teen clubs. When I became 18 or 19, I started doing the adult clubs and then moved onto New York and bigger and better things from there.
So now that you're well established and you've been all over the world, do you have any particular favorite place you like to spin?
Oh, I'd say Ibiza. I compare that to Yankee Stadium. Your dream as a ballplayer--I compare a lot of things to sports--is to play at Yankee Stadium. I believe that was by far my greatest, most amazing experience, playing Pascha in Spain.
As far as your mixes, do you consider your style to be a certain signature sound or do you think that it's a combination?
Remixing is really making the labels happy, making the artist happy, and catering to radio. Our target is to get radio to play these records.
Exactly.
As far as my club mixes, I try to put a progressive, harder edge to that and make it a little more electronica-sounding and add a little bit of edge to the mixes. My main priority is definitely to get radio play. If you stay too underground, you'll be capped at a certain point. I think you need to broaden your horizons a little bit, stay very open minded, and wear a lot of hats.
Now, is there a favorite artist you like to mix?
One of my favorites that I always wanted to work with was Usher. He just constitutes raw talent. He and Justin Timberlake, who I had the opportunity to remix also this year with Beyonce. I just got done with remixes on Usher and working on this Lindsay Lohan project called "Bossy."
Oh really?
Yeah, it's gonna be through Universal Music. They kind of co-hired me to remix this and get the best people on board to make this record happen in the club and radio.
I've heard the record, I really like it.
It grows on you, doesn't it? It's got that hook!
It does!
They're not fully set on the single, but that's definitely something we're breaking in Rhythm Radio.
Very exciting.
Yes, very exciting. We need some good publicity for Lindsay. She's a great person, let's have some positivity for her.
Yeah! I've always supported her music career. I really like what she puts out. [Laughs] No shame.
[Laughs] Very catchy hooks, most importantly.
Definitely. So, I don't know if you heard but the Freemasons got in a bit of heat for turning down Madonna's "Give It 2 Me," they said they were too busy to take on the single at the moment…
I didn't know that. I admire their work. Wow, that's news to me!
I was wondering if that ever happened to you, if you've ever turned down something and later on wish you hadn't?
Oh, I've had that happen on more than one occasion. I remember off-hand now a Jessica Simpson project when I was just getting started on remixing. Certain things don't time stretch properly, they're not in the right element of BPM in its original form. You don't want to make it sound like Mickey or Minnie Mouse with the vocal spinner. They're plenty of projects where I didn't like the original song itself! You gotta remember, your name is getting stamped on that mix along with the song and 
label. There's certain songs that didn't make sense to remix to me.
You've also got a mix show going on BPM81.
I'm fortunate this year to have about seven mix shows. We've got Pulse 87.7 in New York City, I'm on board every Friday Night. Area 51 from Midnight to 2 AM. BPM 81 on XM Radio, the first Sunday of every month, I'm playing there at 10 PM. WBZC (88.9FM) in Pemberton, New Jersey, iPartyRadio.com, the original Hot 97.com, MusicChoice, and I hope I didn't leave anybody out. I think I got them all covered.
That's quite some coverage [laughs]
It's been a busy schedule, but I don't complain when I'm busy…only when I'm not!
That's right. Now, I heard you actually took some time off last year because you just had a baby?
Well, my son's about to turn 3. When he was born, my wife and I decided that we're going to take time away and devote and spend time with our son. I didn't want those first three years to go by and say, "Wow, how did he grow up so fast?" I definitely took some time just to spend with family and concentrate on reinventing my sound.
You feel fulfilled? You feel like you had a pretty steady break?
Oh, very fulfilled. As they say, you can only keep the player off the field for so long. I'm chomping at the bit to get out there.
I've also seen you've done some exciting mixes for Danity Kane, Justin Timberlake, Beyonce…
Yeah, again I was fortunate enough to come back this year and remix these great marquee artists like Danity Kane through Johnny D in Atlantic. He's working closely with Puffy's label, Bad Boy, so they asked me to do the mix, I did it, I turned it in and it's taking off right now!
Yeah, that's a great mix right now.
Yeah, the group is doing well, the single's doing well. I actually did that mix with Robert Larow from Orange Factory, a little collaboration together on that mix. Also, just finished Usher's "Moving Mountains", and there's the Lindsay Lohan project with "Bossy."
And of course I saw some work with my personal favorite, Britney.
Oh yeah, "Break The Ice" did very, very well. I did a speck on "Piece of Me" too. I see that some people incorporated it into a video, I looked it up on Google. [laughs] She's reinventing her sound, I love her album. I was very fortunate to work with Britney.
I was really excited to see you had some mixes on there! [laughs]
It's been a very exciting time this year, it's really been great.
Right now, do you think you're going to tour, or primarily do some mixing?
We're taking baby steps getting back in as far as DJing. Putting a tour together is so time consuming, but July 26th I'll be playing at Sound Bar in Chicago. September 18th in New York City, we have Big Bash on Broadway with Amber, Deborah Cox, Chris Willis, Christian George, and a whole host of people. Mark that on your calendars!
So sorry about the lack of updates lately. Really I'm not, but it looks better to say that I am. I've just returned back from school, and I've decided that my room needs renovating. My chi just doesn't flow like it used to here. My chakras are all unaligned, and I just can't see out my third eye as well as I used to. Therefore, I'm introducing some negative space into the mix. A new workspace for a new me! And all that.
So what's new in the world of Muuse? Not much, really. It's actually a time of reflection here...for once I've been dwelling on the same albums, producing the same amount of content. It's a strange feeling for me...content-ness. I'm not a fan. I remain highly amuused by the album releases of Santogold, Martha Wainwright, and Charlotte Sometimes. This has yet to change, and is causing a certain degree of anxiety from within. Sam Sparro's? Not so much.
After only three weeks, I'm completely over Madonna's Hard Candy, and have deemed it completely forgettable.
Needless to say, I'll be attending the sugar lady's Sticky & Sweet Tour in October.
The new Cyndi Lauper song "Same Ol' Story," in its non-live-screaming-fan version, isn't so bad, but it isn't actually "good." It's just fine. Sadly, the use of the word "fucking" is not in reference to any form of intercourse, thereby hindering any amount of brilliance the song may have redeemed itself with upon first play.
The b-side to Lorraine's current single "When I Return To The World," called "Beyond Sky," is a little bit self explanatory, as it's over-the-moon good. It's a heavenly orchestral composition that lazily floats by with a killer addictive chorus, so don't miss it. You can hear it now at their MySpace!
After two weeks, Lady GaGa's "Just Dance" still pawns. Hard.
So does Lindsay's "Bossy." Forget who's singing for the moment if it offends your sensibilities.
And that's that, for now at least. Yes, I know--there's nothing new here. Deal with it until something new slips through the cracks!
MuuBits--like Cubits, only slightly less relevant to your daily life.
People know I love me some Lohan, from the Mean Girls days to the drinking days, to the coke days over to the rehab days, and back to the coke...so it comes as no surprise that I've always taken a liking to the redheaded firecracker's singing career as well. Her voice isn't too special, though thanks to the hard partying and whatnot, she's got a rather delicious rasp to those chords.
It's been said that her latest album, expected later this year, will be purely focused upon dance rather than the pop/rock she's since been delivering. Tonight I've finally got some confirmation of the genre swap in the shape of a 1:30 minute clip (which must be floating around on the radio hit rating sites right now). Anyway, watch below to hear it! 'Tis called "Bossy" (Sorry Kelis, not referring to you at the moment). The track's got a pretty sweet vibe, some decent echoey vocals, and a thick, throbbing beat. Sure, it's a damn standard dance track. But Lindsay's one of my muses--my cokey, cokey muse. I can't help but feel a wee bit...inspired. Go baby, go!
Bradley
Muuser
| Britney Spears-Womanizer |
| Girls Aloud-The Promise |
| BoA-Eat You Up |
| Annie-2 Of Hearts |
| Alesha Dixon - The Boy Does Nothing |
| Grace Jones-William's Blood |
| Janelle Monae - Many Moons |
| Kaskade-Move For Me |
| Lorraine-Tell It All |
| Frankmusik-3 Little Words |
