Fujirockers: The official fansite of the Fuji Rock Festival

DJ Nobu last year on the decks at the Red Marquee

All-Night Fuji, a special Friday night rave DJ Royal Rumble of sorts, way back in the Orange Court where you can be freaky as you wanna be, celebrating the 10-year anniversary of the festival. And my top pick for Sunday night, Annie Mac closing out the fest in style with one last surge of dancing frenzy, for the win!

Ringing in the 10-year anniversary of Fuji Rock Festival, the bludgeoning jungle-y DnB tracks of DJ AKI, Future Terror artist DJ NOBU, DJ KRUSH, techno axe murderer Ken Ishii, DJ “Psy-Trance” Tsuyoshi, and that is only half the lineup. (Already I have twice been obliterated by DJ Aki who is equally as energetic on stage while he plays as the furious dancers in the dust rising just trying to keep up with his raunchy 280bpms!)

In Osaka and seemingly the whole of Kansai, government has put the sledgehammer to all-night parties. And yet they are putting nuclear reactors back online, disregarding the 80-some percent of the population who begs and protests otherwise. Major bummer. Anyway, unless you live in Tokyo (or Kanazawa) it seems that you are quite possibly doomed to ipod dance parties in your underwear at home on an otherwise awesome Saturday night. Coming from Kyoto, I for one am stoked sideways for the electronic onslaught kicking off Friday night, out at Orange where no one can hear you scream. Continue Reading…

Viva Vinyl

Whether it’s late night at the Orange Court or regular Red Marquee revelry, Fujirock has you covered for DJs. Headliners like Rusko, Z-Trip, Ken Ishii and Riva Star will deliver the goods like they always do, but dig a little deeper into the lineup and you’ll find even more choice selectors.

This year has quite a handful of DJs plucked from bands in the lineup: Alexis Taylor from Hot Chip and James Murphy from LCD Sound System play back-to-back sets at the Red Marquee Sunday night. Both should be stellar, but Murphy’s will be a must-see. Check out his label’s mix series for a primer.

Now dig even deeper and we arrive at the Palace of Wonder, where some of the best spinning takes place every year…

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Green Velvet aka Curtus Jones

Like a lot of house (and other dance music) producers, a lot more of you will know Green Velvet’s music more than those of you who will know his name. Alter ego of Curtis Jones, who has been DJing and producing tracks since the early 90s, Green Velvet’s earlier music had a definite 1980s flavour to it. Big on beats, but far from big beat, the sounds here hark back to Kraftwerk for me. These were tracks that had us on the dancefloor throughout the 90s, sloshing drinks around to the displeasure of all present. Continue Reading…

Z-Trip

Whether it’s in Vegas, Kuwait or your XBox, Zach Sciacca is serious about rocking the party. Better known as DJ Z-Trip, this early progenitor of mashup mixes has been rated as one of the best living DJs: a fact that becomes even more interesting after a quick glance at his career trajectory.

Once the resident DJ at the Palms Hotel in Las Vegas, Continue Reading…

Every festival has certain acts whose popularity and acclaim are foregone conclusions, but here at Fujirock.com we enjoy forecasting the dark horses that go on to be fest highlights. It’s one of my favorite parts of the pre-fest prep: predicting the surprise hits, the acts that no one knows upon arrival but no one forgets after they blow off the roof in front of a throng of first-time viewers. So here, I’d like to start the predictions with one of my own: introducing British beatbox badass Beardyman.

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He was slated to play the very first ever fuji Rock Festival in 1997, but the way the cards fell, and as most of us all know, the typhoon that immortalised the Chilli Peppers as the first Fuji Rock Legends in the festival’s inaugural year meant the entire second day was cancelled, and the his performance along with it. Ironically that day turned out to be perfect weatherwise. He returned in 1999 to play the then named Virgin Tent, now known to all as the Red Marquee. This year marks the first time in over a decade that we will be treated to the analog dub style that is the Mad Professor. Continue Reading…

Grant "Daddy G" Marshall and Robert "3D" del Naja

They pressed buttons when everyone clanged guitars. They created an entire musical genre that they now distance themselves from. They claim musical ineptitude, yet recently were inducted into an elite fraternity of songwriters. It’s hard to judge where Massive Attack’s place will be in the history of pop music, but their influence on the genre cannot be overstated.

Now that original members Robert “3D” del Naja and Grant “Daddy G” Marshall are back on the road together with their best album in a decade, the duo have are making the rounds to the music press about the tour, the record and their band’s unique trajectory.

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The electro party is gonna be pumping hard at FRF2010, and Rusko will be smack dab in the middle of it. His new album, O.M.G. is being released right about the time of this post (May 4 on the US east coast), and you can hear the entire album streaming here!!!!

The album features ATL rapper Gucci Mane, the house vocals from Amber Coffman and a few more trix, so maybe call it a mix of upschool crunk and ghetto house with a massive electro twist. See ya’ll in the Red Marquee, yo!

Her costumes take their cue from a box of crayons, and with a crazy backing band that is part Brazilian samba and London street carnival, Ebony Thomas (nee Ebony Bones) has been getting lots of attention this summer.

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The British DJ known as Fake Blood has done quite well keeping his identity under wraps, even wearing masks behind the decks. But when you’re touring the world, mixing on Radio One and keeping up with Twitter and other social media, it’s only a matter of time before the jig is up.
Links to music and more info after the jump:

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Above: Buraka Som Sistema on Al Jazeera English
Musicians can be an incestuous lot, and that goes double for the DJ set. So I shouldn’t be surprised to find less than six degrees of separation joining many of this year’s late-night performers at the Red Marquee.
More after the jump.

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This song totally blows me away and has been virally circulating through the internet. The dancers in the background, or what Letterman calls, “trick or treaters,” are less than inspiring and don’t do the song justice. Shoot, i would simply like to see Paul Shaffer’s bald head bobbing to this tune.
//sean s.

Hipster mags such as The Fader have been championing Buraka Som Sistema and a handful of other African tinged music for the past couple of months. The music is punchy, high energy, booty shaking stuff, and unlike anything you’ve ever heard before.

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I knew Animal Collective was playing Fuji Rock about 2 months before the official announcement and had a pretty hard time holding my tongue and not blogging about this info. Tell you the truth, I couldn’t be more excited cuz this band is tearing it up on their North American tour, and it is darn hard getting a ticket to their show. As an example, their LA gig at the Fonda Theater was sold out weeks in advance with tix on Craig’s List going for US$150 apiece. Well, I considered paying the price, but unexpectedly ran into them somewhere else…

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DJs are known to be tech-savvy and travel-ready, but Diplo is like MacGyver, Indiana Jones and Grand Master Flash rolled into one.

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