I was born in 1968. I grew up listening to 70's soul, funk and reggae on late night pirate radio stations. In the early 80's I started DJing, long before it had any cache or kudos. I had an ancient pair of belt-driven turntables, two tape decks, and a home-made cross-fader. Working private parties, mates brithdays and school dances I started playing black soul and funk alongside white funk-influenced alternative bands and the new synthesizer based music coming out of Europe. Finally B-Boy culture and, shortly afterwards, House music arrived on our shores in the mid 80's and I was firmly hooked. Over 25 years I've DJ'ed in every type of environment from the backs of dingy pubs in Camden town, to Student Union halls in New Zealand; from playing to a handful of people in a basement to thousands of people in a stadium, from one-off illegal raves on top of high rise car parks, to residencies in some of the biggest clubs in Australasia. My major learning from all of these years in DJ culture is that the best time I ever had, both as a DJ and a clubber, was in the period between 1986 and 1989. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a revisionist or a nostalgic sad case stuck in their eternal youth, what I mean is that between those years there was a scene in the UK, and particularly in London where I lived at the time, like none I've ever seen before. We were blending music of all tastes, styles, and genres. No barriers were too defined to be broken, when we played out we spun tracks that had an emotional impact on the floor, we threw out northern soul alongside the newest hip-hop tracks, experimental European electronica alongside the freshest US house and techno, punk bands mixed with Jamaican dub, NY rap alongside the self-made precursors to dubstep and drum 'n' bass. This was the WAREHOUSE RAVE. Today most music is segmented and packaged into neat little genres and sub-genres. People are closed-mined and self-absorbed in these tiny constricting musical tunnels, only wanting to listen to or appreciate a specific type of music. The final straw came when I was on a peer-2-peer music sharing site and was trying to download a tune from somebody, they actually took the time to send me a message saying that they thought my music collection (which was open to everybody to share) was too "vague" and that the track I wanted to upload from him was too precious and only true house music experts would appreciate the genius of this artist, and he didn't feel that I 'qualified' for such an honour. On that day I decide to wage war on the music nazis that seem to have taken over club music. I immediately started to i) distribute DJ mixes that contained as many differing genres as possible to expose people to the plethora of brilliant music and new unsigned artists, producers and remixers in every area of electronica, and ii) to tackle an age old gripe of mine as a DJ and have somebody do the hard work of trawling through the crates (even if they are now virtual) and pull together the quality tunes each month from as many genres as possible so I can appreciate what's going on in clubland as a whole, not just one small segement of it. So that's what I've done. Here's the results, mixed live, warts 'n' all, by yours truly. Hopefully they'll allow you to listen, not only to the the types and styles of music that you love, but also expose you to new creative and innovative artists in lots of other genres, encouraging open-mindedness and cross-pollination in all styles and cultures. Remember, a good tune is a good tune, no matter what the genre. Listen, Accept, Learn, Enjoy - Mikey