For all the house heads, one of Detroit's finest and our favorite producer of the past few years will join one of the top DJ/producers out of Argentina at the Loft April 16. Delano Smith has been dj'ing since the 80s and producing since '02. His style blurs the lines between deep house and techno better than most and his productions consistently earn him rave reviews (and land in our record box), including a stellar remix for Leonel Castillo on Suech that has people asking for the name every time it's dropped.
Last October Leonel Castillo toured the US for the first time and got a lot of attention doing it. He's a veteran DJ from Buenos Aires and has countless hours of unreleased material spanning deep house to techno and experimental with a few releases on Airdrop, Suech, Lilan Tape, and Telegraph. His track "Y El Viento Blanco" appeared on Thomas Melchior's Circoloco 10 Years Anniversary mix.
Delano Smith
(Suech, Third Ear, Detroit)
Leonel Castillo
(Airdrop, Suech, Buenos Aires)
Juan Zapata
(ELM, ECB, DC)
Navbox
(Stranger Than Paradise, DC)
Delano Smith:
Born in Chicago and raised on Detroits West side, Delano Smith represents one of the last of a rare group of Detroits first house DJs. Perhaps it was the juvenile absorption of the sights and sounds around him during his first 5 years in the Windy City coupled with his experience during the new DJ craze of his high school years in Detroit that influenced Delano the most or maybe it is simply that enigmatic link between music people in Chicago and Detroit, known to insiders as the I94 Connection. Regardless of the reason for his natural ear for the deep and groovy, Smith can lay claim to a legacy that most Detroit jocks cannot. He was one of the original young guns personally mentored by Motowns 1st DJ, Ken Collier. Though Smith may have taken an extended hiatus later in his DJ years, it is this direct link to the beginnings of the DJ in Detroit that has maintained his integrity today.
Leonel Castillo is undoubtedly Argentina's most gifted producer. While his releases remain extremely rare, his daily creations keep adding and adding onto the thousands of tracks he produced over the past 20 years.
On this very special artist EP - Leonel Castillo, the great engineer, sets some intricate rhythms in motion, forging El Salon De Los Espejos into a highly feverish hotbox of a record. Get this right : no other man can develop such elaborate and thumping patterns as he does.
From his luscious grooves featured on Suech, to the stripped aesthetics as heard on Illian Tape or even his grand dubby techno textures from his record last year on Andrés Zacco's Greener Records - needless to say, Leonel covers a wide and complete musical range to perfection.
Recently, Leonel Castillo was also featured on Resident Advisor's esteemed podcast series. On that occasion, he prepared 90 minutes of his own unreleased productions only, mixed under a hybrid live and dj set format - a recording about which followers commented wildly about for weeks on.
