Cats and pets make the solitary work of a creative person so much better. They are like a witness to your special moments and flows and offer no judgement – just their simple presence to the channeling one does when finding new sounds in the machines 9or what ever your instrument and setup of choice is).

My cat – Sati – happens to alight to a small space right below my monitors to sleep most days, often leaving a small puddle of fur hinting at her presence.

Of course, unlike me – who used to fall asleep inside giant speaker cabinets at raves growing up – she chooses to leave me to do my thang while I switch them on, but than loyally returns at the end of sessions to reclaim her spot amongst my instruments and gear. In Southern California street slang, one would say that she leaves ‘good jujus’ in my studio. Well, that and some fur.

Anyway, this podcast came through my feed which is incredible and has such wise advice for any creative person or DJ/musician/remixer; The stories around new tracks. Editing and publishing. Managing DJs. ‘Playing mom’ to a bunch of guys. Proving yourself as a DJ in Europe before breaking out in the US. DJing as storytelling (duh). Cycles of industry and heart. House music in NYC in the 80’s. Ibiza before motorways were put in. 60 year old DJs. Legacy.

Definitely a great interview and worth listening to if you not only like house music and DJing, but also about what it takes to connect people to good music without a ‘system’ or ‘industry’ to do it for you.

I’ll probably be listening to this again on repeat for the pearls of wisdom that lie within it.

Few people have been there for as many of dance music’s foundational moments as Judy Weinstein. Her story starts right at the beginning: at David Mancuso’s Loft, which she’d eventually have a hand in managing. She worked with Mancuso on his seminal record pool before going on to form her own, For The Record, which serviced New York’s DJ circuit during its heyday. Weinstein is probably best known, though, for the company she keeps by way of Def Mix, the label and management company she founded with her old record pool employee David Morales in the ’80s. Def Mix never had a big roster, but the artists she worked with, including Morales, Satoshi Tomiie and the late Frankie Knuckles, are legendary. When I visited Def Mix’s office in Manhattan on a recent Friday afternoon, I found her still hard at work on a number of projects, including Knuckles’s posthumous House Masters compilation, which saw release earlier this week through Defected. From her time as Larry Levan’s roommate to her first inadvertent trip to Ibiza, she brought a wealth of stories to this decades-spanning conversation.

EX.248 Judy Weinstein by RA Exchange

A quintessential dance music insider goes on the record. For more, visit Resident Advisor: http://www.residentadvisor.net/podcast-episode.aspx?exchange=247