A mixtape can be many things, but one thing is for sure, a mixtape is more than just random songs put in a particular order. It’s about recontextualizing sounds, giving them a new meaning (sometimes very different from the original) by setting them side by side, or juxtapozed in ingenious ways with others. Best thing about mixtapes, most of them are FREE (!), and they’re a great way to discover new music. In this new column, we’ll give you a worthy one every week.
DJ: Alya Joya
I’m gonna start this new weekly mixtape column, Weekly Mezcolanza (brought to you by yours truly, DJ Juan Data), with a recent release by Hipi Duki Musik for their Soundamerica series. Each volume of this always innovative series is compiled by a different selector. In this particular case, that’s Argentina’s Alta Joya.
Alta Joya is the DJ alter-ego of Vic Fabrice, hyperactive blogger of the Cooliado family, mashup artist, trend setter, cat lover, nudity enthusiast, and one of the extremely few female DJs in the tropical bass scene. Unfortunately 🙁
Her mixtape is quite short, only nine songs in 20 minutes and I was a little disappointed by this in the beginning, but it ends up working out perfectly. Sometimes less can be more, or at least enough. Her focus is not on fast cuts, fancy effects or skillful blends, but more on creating a cohesive atmosphere throughout the set and she achieves this wonderfully. This is particularly hard when you mix songs from very different styles and tempos, and somehow she manages to create a sense of unity, which I guess is the whole point of doing a mixtape. Overall it’s a beautiful, tropical, colorful, shiny, feel-good mix that I can picture myself listening to while getting ready for a night out. Fortunately, I’m a dude so I don’t take too long to get dressed. But if you’re like some girls I know, you might need to put this on repeat.
DOWNLOAD ALTA JOYA’S SUDAMERICA VOL. 15 HERE.