DJ Zack Darling
Posted by Zack Darling
Here you can find my latest music endeavors and download DJ mixes as they are released. The only thing I ask is that if you like the music, share it with friends and comment on this page! Enjoy!
After years of hiding out in my music studio and “reinventing” myself as a DJ, I have resurfaced. I haven’t released a CD in over four years and have rarely been gigging over the past two. As an avid collector of vinyl, the digital migration was a slow and methodical one for me. As a dance floor DJ I found myself moving from my strong association with nu-skool breakbeats in favor of a much more eclectic style of mashups and bootlegs. My passions for reggae, downtempo, chill and classic 60′-80′s rock have remained strong and clearly found their way into my new eclectic flavor. I sincerely hope you enjoy this music as much as I do.
Rasta Rediscovered, Volume 1
This is a mix that has been in the works for many years. After finally compiling my collection of reggae mashups and remixes, I discovered that I had enough great music for more than one mix, so here is volume one. Rasta Rediscovered is an exploration of Reggae through Mashups, Bootlegs, remixes & rare re-creations. This eclectic mix of Reggae mashups and strange re-creations bring together many musical genres under the familiar bass lines and beloved riddims of Jah Music. This is a live mix by yours truly.
This is a free high quality download. The only request I have is that you share it with friends. If you like the music, please leave a comment!
This mix was recorded and mixed live by DJ Zack Darling on February 6th, 2010. The above track is a high quality MP3 at 320 kpbs.Lettuce Turnip Beets, Volume 1
This mix is named after a magical night with my friends Cassidy & Christina as we tromped around Oregon Country Fair creating puns out of various farm terms. The best which was Lettuce Turnip Beets. Over the coming months I plan on releasing a number of new mixes to blast off the coming 2010 summer festival season. Stay tuned for more as I currently have 14 different mixes in progress. This mix is a slower dance set that ranges from 92 to 100 BPM. The next 2 mixes from this series will be a bit faster with a similar style of mashups intertwined with thick dance beats.
Please! Burn this mix. Bump it in your car! Share it with friends. Put it on your iPod. Turn it up and crank the bass! Comment on this page and let me know your thoughts!
I truly hope you enjoy this music as much as I do.
This mix was recorded and mixed live by DJ Zack Darling on January 18th, 2010. The above track is a high quality MP3 at 320 kpbs.Lettuce Turnip Beets, Volume 2
The second set of the Lettuce Turnip Beets series defies genres and revisits familiar songs in new ways. This one ramps it up a bit from the first mix in tempo as well as energy. With a BPM of about 125 it’s a whomper dance set that should hopefully inspire you to turn it up and move your body. Again, with all my music, this is a very eclectic mix that should spread the gamut of generations and music styles. Take a trip through mashups, breaks, house, classic rock, reggae, electro, and some that cannot be classifiied. Enjoy the music and share it!
Download it! Share it with friends. If you enjoy this music, the only thing I ask is that you help me get it out there by forwarding this webpage to others!
This mix was recorded and mixed live by DJ Zack Darling on January 21st, 2010. The above track is a high quality MP3 at 320 kpbs.Zack Darling – DJ Bio
Zack’s propensity for scratching records was revealed one morning when, as a toddler, he was discovered scooting around on the floor atop one of his mother’s favorite Jimi Hendrix records. He attended his first rock concert, Jefferson Airplane, in the womb and so his passion for the concert experience was sparked.
Growing up in a colorful counterculture household, he was exposed to the music of the times and loved it all. Rather than a television, Zack had a wall of vinyl and a turntable to play it on. He began his own vinyl collection at an early age and still has his full collection of Sesame Street albums.
Zack learned to be a percussionist on a tiny trap set, under the tutelage of a Scottish bagpiper and Rock drummer, from whom he also learned to love European bands such as Queen, Pink Floyd, Yes, the Who, and Jeff Beck. His music oriented family’s vast collection of Classic Rock, Folk, 80′s New Wave, and early electronic “Space Music” provided a musically enriched upbringing.
At age fourteen, Zack got his first DJ gig on a late night local public radio show. This grew into a passion for radio and eventually pirate radio. He and his friends launched several pirate radio stations, until one day the FCC triangulated their signal and Zack was officially warned never to be found in the vicinity of a pirate station ever again. Zack’s teen years were heavily influenced by Alternative, Punk, Hip Hop and Reggae music as he frequented big concerts like Lollapalooza and festivals such as Reggae on the River.
After graduating high school in 1993, Zack moved into the world of electronic dance music and for several years was an active underground producer in the San Francisco and North Bay rave culture. Subsequently, thanks to the influence of his best friend, Damian Peters, he learned to beat-match records and began dance floor DJing himself. Starting with House and Breakbeats, he moved into Nu Skool Breaks and became interested in paralleling dance floor music with other types, including reggae and downtempo chill.
In 2004, Zack and long time friends Raychill Grail and Patrick Malone (DJ Malarkey) hosted a popular weekly late night public radio show called The Chill Room. For several years on Sunday night they played three hours of Downtempo, Chill, Acid Jazz, Triphop, Electronica and Reggae.
Meanwhile, Zack’s record collection was growing and he was regularly spinning at night clubs and parties large and small, including Decadance, Space Cowboys, Mystic Beat Lounge’s Techno-Tribal Dance, as well as some of the biggest clubs in San Francisco, like 1015 Folsom, Sea of Dreams and Kelly’s Mission Rock. He also played many large festivals, including Burning Man, Burning Man Decompression Street Fair and Harmony Festival. Zack has played every year as a headliner at Earth Dance Festival for a decade now, and was the first electronic dance music DJ to play the main stage at Reggae on the River, where he frequently co-hosts the legendary after-hours night beach parties.
After a short hiatus during which he transitioned from vinyl and CDs into digital files and learning Serato, a popular laptop based record collection & DJ software application, Zack has recently emerged from his music studio with a dedicated passion for DJing Mashups, Remixes an Bootlegs which he has been fervently collecting since the 90′s. He finds this a musical genre through which he can express all of his influences and tastes, and that appeals to several generations and dance floor crowds. He feels he is breathing life into music that was not written for the dance floor and has not been widely heard for many years.
Zack’s new CD releases are expressions of the alignment between the Mashup and dance floor worlds. Zack is moving forward into a style where he can follow all of his passions, old and new, merging Breakbeats, House, Dubstep and Mid-Tempo Hip Hop, with Reggae, New Wave, Folk, Funk, Soul and especially classic Rock favorites – remixed, retooled, repurposed for the dance floor.
The emerging name for this unique musical flavor of bass-heavy dance floor bootlegs? Mashstep.
4 Responses to “DJ Zack Darling”
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Doug Says:
January 21st, 2010 at 4:48 amThanks Zak,
Got it down and will have time to check it out on the beaches of Baja. -
Ira Says:
January 29th, 2010 at 7:09 pmLove you Zack! These are great, and i get to show you off tonight a Serena’s B-day.
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chadwick Says:
January 29th, 2010 at 9:45 pmSick mash ups you killed it at Hop Monk last night, thanks for the download, just told 101 ‘friends’ to go to yer site.
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J Seaver Says:
March 2nd, 2010 at 11:34 pmLove new Rasta Rediscovered release. Thanks Zack!
