BY MELISSA BEARNS
DJ Wicked
Diablos/
Downtown Lounge
Wednesday,
Nov. 24, 9 pm
Behind the Wicked Image
Breakfast with Oregon’s top hip-hop DJ
D
So where’d the name come from?
Actually it’s an old graffiti name I used to
use. It kind of stuck with me when I started
DJ’ing.
Tell me about Got Milf? It’s kind of differ-
ent from what you usually do.
I really went out there with that one. It’s
got all these songs from the ’80s and ’90s. It’s
the first time I did a project where I strayed
away from hip-hop. The way I put it together
is the way DJs put hip-hop music together,
with the scratching, but it’s not hip-hop.
What was it like growing up in Portland?
To me it feels like a small town. I feel like
it’s still behind as far as the music scene goes.
[In San Francisco] I met a lot of people that
really inspired me. After being down there for
a couple of years, I came back to Portland
and that’s when I really starting pushing,
started gigging out a lot.
What’s kept you in it, passionate about it?
Just the music itself — It’s so much a part
of my everyday life. The whole thing, espe-
cially with turntablism, being able to create
music as opposed to just play stuff other peo-
ple have done.
What does the term turntablism mean to
you in your music?
That’s probably the hardest thing to
explain to people. It’s just manipulating
records to create new sounds. Like on Got
Milf?, there’s a hidden track at the end that’s
entirely turntablism. It’s its own music, using
records to create a song.
How have people reacted to Got Milf? It’s
kind of playful and funny.
espite the fact that he’d been up
most of the night spinning at the
Domino Room (in Bend) and said
he was really tired, DJ Wicked ordered not
coffee but vitamin-filled orange juice when
we met for breakfast over the summer. That
morning he was wearing a D.C. baseball hat
and T-shirt with Portland across the front,
both black. It had been a late night and an
early morning. He had faint circles under his
eyes — par for the course for someone who
spends most of his nights in clubs until the
wee hours.
Meeting him in person, I was struck by
the disparity between the friendly, kind of
quiet, almost shy guy in front of me and the
image. Easily Oregon’s top hip-hop DJ, the
stuff DJ Wicked puts together is incredibly
creative. His mix tapes are always full of
cool, weird stuff. And he plays the part. If you
look at his recorded stuff, he comes across as
super-hyped, with that image of a party ani-
mal.
Actually, DJ Wicked doesn’t even drink.
Growing up in northeast Portland, he started
spinning in 1992. Two years later he moved
to San Francisco, at the time when spinning,
or turntablism, was just taking off. He made
his way back to Portland and now opens for
almost every major hip-hop show that comes
to Oregon, including Eminem a few years
back.
Six months ago, he quit his day job to DJ
full-time and just released a new CD, Got
Milf?, a play on the “Got Milk” commercials,
milk mustache picture and everything.
W i n t e R
Bravo!
I’ve already caught a lot of flack for it.
Like what?(At that point he grinned and
looked away)
Um, I’d really rather not say. The CD is so
silly. I just wanted to have a good time with
it. All those songs are old enough that people
in their 30s would know them. The whole
thing is all good fun.
What’s in your CD player right now?
DJ D Styles. He’s really dark and techni-
cal, a scratch DJ.
Do you have anyone you really admire,
any idols?
BY MELISSA BEARNS
Coming at You
No Cash Value leads the punk rock pack.
I
t’s taken four years, but Bend-based No Cash Value is finally gaining some well-
deserved recognition. Let’s start with one basic element many punk bands miss:
These guys can actually play their instruments. Really well.
Bass player Owen Evans is the oldest member, downright geriatric at 29 compared
to lead singer and guitarist Andrew McCumber, 25, and drummer Alan Burmeister, 21.
McCumber and Burmeister grew up in John Day and had been playing together for five
years before Evans joined them after sitting in on a practice at a friend’s garage.
Watching them together is like watching the love/hate relationship of three brothers
who are also best friends. (“Sometimes you’ve gotta get on them because they’re like lit-
tle brothers,” said Evans about McCumber and Burmeister. “You’re going to let that Nazi
control freak speak for us?” said McCumber. “Oh great.”)
Listening to them, all that comes across is clean, hard, So-Cal punk rock in the tradi-
tion of Bad Religion, Rancid, Offspring and Agent Orange.
These guys have a sense of humor too; a “We’re gonna play whatever we want even
if it is James Taylor because that’s a really good song and if you don’t like it go outside
and smoke a cigarette” attitude.
Yeah, they do cover “Fire and Rain”
and also an almost soulful, gritty, rau-
cous version of Sam the Sham’s “Little
Red Riding Hood.” But “Motherfucker”
is by far their best song, a song Evans
wrote about getting the crap kicked out
of him by a bunch of Nazi skinheads
while he was down in Mexico. It’s just
pure, angry, hard, biting punk rock. And
that’s how you could describe most of
their stuff.
“I was sitting trying to write some
No Cash Value
songs and I was being way too technical,”
w/ Monkee Torture,
said Evans with a laugh. “I was trying all
PB Army, The
these rhythm changes and alternate chord
Anxieties and The
progressions. And then I was just like,
Perverts.
you know, this is stupid. Punk rock isn’t
The Wetlands
all operatic and changey. Punk rock needs
Saturday, 9pm.
to just come right at you.”
ew
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A few. Mr. Dibbs, MixMaster Mike. Who
else … there’s so many people. D Styles, Q
Bert.
Do you have any crazy stories, like
nights when something’s just gone totally
wrong?
(Laughing) Oh man, so many nights. One
night this girl came up and flipped my whole
table over. That was pretty disastrous.
You’re pretty successful at this point in an
industry where there’s a lot of competition.
Did you ever get a big break?
No. I’m still waiting for it.
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NOVEMBER 24, 2004 2 3