DJ OF THE WEEK 6.24.13: DJ BL3ND

DJ Bl3nds backstory is not too hard to find out as his bio is posted on his site and his FB page. What is hard to find however is his real identity and with that the particulars of this individual from Los Angeles, California. Hit up Google in search of answers and you’ll quickly come across sites, forums, and a slew of comments from people claiming to know his real name, to be related to him, even videos that claim to show pics of him, but no real concrete proof of his real government name. You know what else you find, a lot of people that hate him. Turns out DJ Bl3nd is quite the polarizing figure. More on that later.

So, what do we know? Well, we know that he is of Mexican descent, which means he fits in perfectly with our month long focus on Latino DJs for the month of June. If he isn’t (he is) well, we just got played, but that’s ok, the dude wears a clown mask. I’d see it as a good thing.

From his bio and a few interviews we have found, we learned that he got his first pair of turntables when he was a teenager. At some point, wanting to get noticed he began handing out CDs to DJs at local clubs and anyone who he thought could help him get his foot in the door. When that failed, he turned to the Internet and this is where it all began to change.

On September 9, 2009, Bl3nd posted the first of what would be a series of YouTube videos of him DJing in his bedroom, dancing like a madman, strobe lies and all, the entire time wearing that now famous scary clown mask. The videos did a lot more for him than handing his CDs out could ever have done. They began to get some traction, ok, a lot of it. Views hit 10K, 20K, 200K, one million! Bl3nd went viral. The comments sections began filling up with fans and haters alike, but mostly fans who would go on to call themselves, ‘Bl3nders’.

Eventually, Bl3nds videos began getting attention from those who hadn’t given his CDs a second thought. Soon after club dates followed, and now just a few short years later, he’s traveling the country tearing it up at clubs such as Lizard Lounge in Dallas, Church Nighclub in Denver, Fur in DC, Pacha and Webster Hall in New York City and a whole slew of other clubs throughout the country. There is also the festival circuit and he’s done his damage there as well at events such as Electric Zoo in NYC, the Awakening festival in Chicago, Valley Massive in California, and more. To each stop Bl3nd brings that same chaotic energy to the masses that he displayed in his room in those now famous videos, and they’re eating it up.

Bl3nd is now producing his own music too, many of which he offers for free on his website. And his latest video, just released this past week, is just as energetic and crazy but with a much higher production budget than those he did back in his bedroom.

As for his sound, Bl3nd brings it and he brings it hard! To say he simply plays big room bangers is an understatement. First of all, he takes so called big room bangers and manages to blow them the fuck up. He also incorporates a lot of mashups and throws in remixes of new school and old school R&B, Pop, Rock, and more assuring that a wide spectrum of people will hear something they are familiar with. In fact, though his style is hard and he does play some hard underground shit, the fact is Bl3nd plays a lot of that commercial EDM you hear increasingly on the radio. He just does it wearing a mask, the entire time moving and going bananas, and this infectious attitude will have you doing the same.

Bl3nd has a lot of haters out there and I must say, to those who question the validity of his videos view counts, yall are bugging. And to those who think he’s not a good DJ, I say, if you think he’s not talented, you might as well just leave the entire genre behind. I mean, the proof that he is as good as some of the biggest names out there is right there in the videos. You can see him blending, though he appears to use the sync button as well, but you cant fake song selection and that energy, man, that energy! I mean, it’s not because he’s Mexican, right? Nah, that can’t be it. But it does make you wonder.

Regardless of the controversy that surrounds him, fact is Bl3nd is going places, even if he still can’t play outside of the United States. See, Bl3nd may have fans all over the world eagerly awaiting a visit from the clown masked DJ, but they’ll have to wait. Apparently, whoever is behind the mask doesn’t have his Visa yet, so he can’t do any parties abroad. Hopefully, that will change soon enough and he can take his wild ass show across the border to South America where legions of Latinos eagerly await a big name DJ that is very much like them. And he’ll also be taking it across the pond, where I’m sure they’ve never met a Latino like this.