Welcome to what is now my fourth column for MTV’s The Wrap Up! As regular readers will know, I was on my honeymoon at the beginning of last month but, while I was away until January 11, it certainly hasn't meant that things have been any less crazy. Pretty soon after I got back from my Mexican honeymoon, I was over in Antwerp, Belgium, to hit up the Petrol Club. After that it was straight on to Poland to drop it at 'Hospitality'...
I was there Stamina MC, Joker, Netsky,Youngsta and John B and, although it was absolutely freezing, we had an absolutely blinding one. The club was completely packed! It was just an insane night with my Kiss FM partner-in-crime, Crazy D. Then on January 20, we had the long-awaited Sin City vs True Tiger night at London's super-club, Fabric. Youngman did a live PA of his new single, and the whole night was simply brilliant. We've been getting great feedback from it and it's something that we're going to be doing continuously throughout the year, probably 3-4 times over the next 12 months.
As you may have gathered from my columns, every month is packed with playing out and taking dubstep to people all over the world. Saturday just gone, I played at Mansion in York from 11-12am and I was straight on the motorway to play at B Live's birthday bash in Northampton just a few hours later. The Firestation in Bournemouth follows this weekend, and plans have been made over the last couple of weeks to ensure that we keep on giving the dubstep crowds what they want. I've just been confirmed to do a few shows over at Miami's massive Winter Music Conference in March – which brings together the biggest collection of DJs from around the world, has over 400 events and around 100,000 people attending.
HATCHA'S DUBSTEP CHRONICLES (JANUARY)
I'm taking in Canada before Miami and then at the WMC, I'll be doing shows with Tinie Tempah, Cypress Hill and headlining the ‘Smog Dubstep’ and ‘Basshead’ shows. We're also in the process of organising a Sin City tour in Japan, a boat party at Outlook Festival, and a Sin City vs Metal Heads night. That'll be May/June time and it's getting a lot of hype already, which is always exciting. There's a strong line up, but I'm not giving any names away just yet – you’ll have to keep waiting for those (laughs). I've also been talking with The Wrap Up’s grime columnist and my Kiss FM colleague, Logan Sama, about doing a tour around the UK - a crossover of both dubstep and grime in one night for all the fans - with Crazy D, Mighty Moe and Flow Dan likely to be involved. Keep your eyes peeled for more information that!
On the music front, I've signed a number of releases to the Sin City label this month. Mr Boogie is the next one to drop, followed by Cessman's EP and tracks from Cato, Vodex, Laxx and Hijack to watch out for as well. I'm in the process of building a home studio at the minute and work has progressed nicely these last few weeks. It's going to be great to be able to set the decks up in there and have all the equipment to finish up my remixes for all of the Sin City releases, as well as prepping for live shows.
I'll sign-off with my Top 10 of the month for February, a couple of these you may recognise from January's 'Best of 2011' column but they're so big and getting more and more love that they really shouldn't be slept on:
1. Skream - 'Profuse'
2. Jakes - 'Cadi'
3. N-Type & Surge - 'Triangles'
4. Laxx & Farkas - 'Hide & Seek'
5. Megaladon - 'Wicked So'
6. Cato Feat. Lucy Randell - 'Spotlight'
7. Lost - 'Rebel Rabbit'
8. Sub ZeeD - 'Hold Me'
9. Cest Man Feat. Flow Dan - 'Gurkha'
10. Vodex - '22 Inch Chest'
Alright, so that’s it for another month. Enjoy the rest of your February and make sure you’re locked into Kiss FM, every Tuesday night/Wednesday morning from 12-1am to hear me dropping some of those tracks I just mentioned, as well as some new dubplates!
Catch up with all of you in March!
DJ Hatcha was speaking to James Walsh (@JW_DittoMusic)
Online editing: Joseph 'JP' Patterson (@Jpizzledizzle)
