Yoshi

METICULOUS REDONKULOUS

Thanks again for the lift, man! Yeah, I got there okay. Had a great time in Vek's room, despite some troubles with the hotel staff...

Vek was on top form!!! As a long-time fan of Izoh, I have to say his routine yesterday was absolute garbage. I couldn't believe he could go that low. Not a second of his routine was pleasing to the ears, but just noise. He must've been really uninformed about what the music scene is like in the UK, because he was using shit dubstep and drumstep, which was also the case for most of the other entrants. People don't listen to that shit any more, they listen to like Mumford & Sons! Do your fucking research, not work on some stupid prejudice. Precision, despite being one of the sickest jugglers in the world, resorted to effects on the rane and the juggle patterns were really simple, way below his usual level. The beats he used were boring, but at least they weren't dubstep. I didn't like Ruftone. The scratches were boring. He's basically not doing anything but releasing the pre-programmed melody for the Star Wars routine. And I can't remember any of his juggles because they were so unmemorable. He may have been the one to juggle Sweet Shop, which was noisy shit. Basically, my opinion of the night is that it was hella NOISY. For me, the evening was (1) waiting to hear Vek's set; and after that (2) staying on only to hear the results. All the shit in between made me so un-fucking-comfortable I wanted to just leave the venue. Seriously, DMC is fucked up. If people like Vek and Jon can't win, and Izoh's routine gets the 1st place, either the judges are really fucking stupid or it's rigged from the start.

Voting closes on 30th September! Backtrack Eric Mo Sy

Getting the Sennheiser HD25-1II was probably the best investment I've ever made. The sound quality on those headphones is WICKED.

Nah man, I wish! GM Yoshi is like a proper old school DJ from Japan - he's been in the DJ game for YEARS. He was one of Japan's best hip hop DJs back in the day. He sure deserves the title "Grand Master."

Vekked is a BEAST!

I started out hamster and then after 2 years I switched to regular under Miyajima's influence, then I went back to hamster for a while. I cut both ways now, and my view on this is that regular allows you to cut really fast (primarily because of the pinching method) but I tend to use hamster when I want to record my scratches, like for scratch hooks in a hip hop track, because it sounds more precise, to me at least, and I find it easier to control the sound when cutting hamster. But the main thing is that there are things you can do on hamster that you can't do as well on regular, and vice versa (eg. I can do stabs much better on hamster). I personally think everyone should experiment with both styles, simply because you learn shit you would never have imagined when using the other style. Same with left hand and right hand - it's good to experiment with both.

cocoB?!!

Canon 550D is the BEST. I can show you how it works and all that, Jimmy. I filmed this with it:

I don't like ASAP. What are people's thoughts on the Odd Future guys?

CAMBIAN SHOULD ENTER

I expect each member of the Wu-Tang Clan to fail to achieve 10 by your standards. And Busta Rhymes.

Surely, having the Bee Gees as a guest ("Ups & Downs") gets him a 1? And Bootsy Collins ("Can I Get a Flicc Witchu") too? Also, he's good on Lil' Ghetto Boy.

Drop It Like It's Hot is from his own album, Pharrell is the guest. You forgot Deep Cover. And I like Signs. R&G is a really good commercial album.

Winner of the Beat Battle : Backtrack Congratulations! Scratch Battle deadline is the 27th. Looking forward to the entries!

I use D's Tablecloth. Maybe I'm just weak — I have, like, less than half your muscle mass, man.

Wiley and Immortal Technique gigs added.

Not only Sony, but also Sharp, Fujitsu, etc... Japan's fucked right now. And the politics has never been worse... It's alienating everyone in Asia.

S-arm and straight arm don't really matter - I have a PDX3000 with the fancy dynamic blah blah tonearm but it still skips as much as a technics. Personally, I think it's more about needles and setting up the height and weight properly than anything else. Also, I've been using the STR8-150 for the past year, and I have to say the torque is way too high for scratching comfortably. The turntable itself is super heavy too. I've used Technics, TTX, STR8-150, PDX (2000, 2300, 3000, A1), PDT-5000, and Citronix, but the Technics is definitely the most reliable and my favourite one. My next favourite is the PDT-5000.

w00p w00p

I've been waiting all this time so that I can change from my piece-of-shit Samsung phone to the iPhone 5. But they come out with this crap? I'm gonna get the HTC One X instead now.

El-P show was crazy! Scala was absolutely packed, barely had enough space to jump. Nice to know there are that many people who appreciate real hip hop. He finished with Deep Space 9mm and everyone knew the lyrics!

Thanks Steve! Yes, I've been a bit busy.

Damn... artists who put money before the audience are the most contemptible!