Last Saturday DJ Food‘s Strictly Kev was playing in a place called Babylon, here in Istanbul, as part of the Akbank Jazz Festival. DJ Food is a project by several turntablists (including Coldcut) creating jazzy breaks and is one of the best projects to come from the Ninja Tune label. Strictly Kev is the public face of DJ Food and travels the world playing their music. Below, a video I made with some of the highlights of the gig.
It was a nice night, with breakbeats blended with jazz, hiphop, balkan beats, latin house, classic britpop, oldies and more. The 1.5 hour set left many hungry for more, but a local DJ playing afterwards was able to satisfy most visitors’ appetites.
Stictly Kev played a phenomenal set. He used a computer with two digital turntables. Meaning he wasn’t playing with actual records, but loading tracks from the computer onto the turntables and then using those for his mixing. He easily switched from style to style, without anyone really noticing the difference. As I have some DJ experience myself, I was in awe at this guy’s skill and ease, although it’s possible he’s playing the same set throughout his whole tour.
A very funky, danceable night, which I’m sure you’re able to see in the video. The Turkish music fans are an ecstatic bunch, their dancing and hopping around being accompanied by frequent shouts and flailing arms.
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