DJ Lithium

DJ Lithium started out originally playing industrial and early trance during the start of the 90s, but for several years was a VJ before going fully into underground dance music. The son of a broadcast DJ/on-air personality (Bob Myers) he grew up literally "in the booth" as well as behind the scenes of his mother's dancing school. Exposed to popular and classical music from an early age via these influences didn't directly drive an interest in music until much later. It was the technology that attracted him to dance music production, recording and DJing first and foremost. This has lead to an obsession of sorts as DJ Lithium is well known for being a staunch supporter of vinyl DJ and manufacturing technology. He has challenged some of the world's largest and well known DJs for selling out the art form having predicted the rise of commercial "EDM" and the eventual backlash against it years before others in the industry recognized digital DJ technology as being instrumental in having played a major, negative role. As the founder of Black Tiger Recordings in 2001 with long time friend, DJ and production partner Earl Von Bye (Trevor Bye), DJ Lithium was an innovator in internet radio. His station located at www.blacktigerrecordings.com/trance.pls has been on line since continously since the initial release of ShoutCast/Winamp software in early 1998, predating DI.FM (aka digitallyimported.com) and began releasing mixed DJ sets to various online stations including di.fm in 1999. Several of his DJ mixes released through di.fm have become legendary with many still in rotation on that station's classic trance channel. His breakthrough mix "When Angels Know Your Name" in April of 2001 firmly positioned his place in the underground trance scene worldwide. It is rumored that this DJ mix garnered close to 60,000 downloads directly from his website in just a few short weeks, nearly bankrupting him in the process due to bandwidth charges. At the time he was living in Vancouver, Canada and was forced to relocate back to Edmonton, Alberta after the local film/tv industry which he has worked in since the early 90s, collapsed following the 9/11 terrorist attacks. While in Edmonton, DJ Lithium began pushing Black Tiger Recordings as an active vinyl pressing label for trance music. The only one in Canada during those years and helped to launch the careers of several artists who went on to larger labels. During the early months of 2002, DJ Lithium began a new radio show called "Progression Session" on Di.FM which aired briefly on that station slotted immediately before another DJ, dutch based Armin Van Buuren's ASOT (A State of Trance) which at the time was relatively unknown outside of Holland. The listener rates for DJ Lithium's Progression Session exceeded that of ASOT while on DI.FM but was cancelled after a dispute with DI.FM operator Ari Shohat regarding exclusivity. In response, DJ Lithium along with several other popular DI.FM Djs formed a new show known as "N.A.T.O." or the North American Trance Order, with DJ Lithium serving as the resident and host. N.A.T.O. aired on several smaller stations including Afterhoursdjs.org and ETN.FM starting in the spring of 2002 and ran for over 60 episodes. During this time the first 3 12" vinyl releases on Black Tiger Recordings were released almost back to back gaining traction for the artists and the label internationally. In early 2003 DJ Lithium returned to Vancouver, Canada to again work in the film and television industry while continuing to self-fund releases on Black Tiger Recordings of several artists including Incolumis, Krivi, e:Mortal, D-Wave and trance[]control. With a heavy work schedule on shows like StarGate: SG1 and Atlantis in 2004 DJ Lithium continued to release several, now legendary mixed sets including "Behind Enemy Lines", "Infiltrator", "Heaven's Kingdom" and "The Return of the DEJI" while DJing in Vancouver as well as internationally a semi-regular basis. However in the spring of 2005, having re-established himself in the visual effects industry in Vancouver, DJ Lithium began working on SyFy channel's "Battlestar Galactica" and less and less of his time went to DJing gigs. By late 2005 he was unable to keep both going due to the 16 hour a day 6 day work week although during this time managed to release 2 more 12" records on Black Tiger Recordings of other artists (BTR-009, BTR-010 and TK-421-001) while building a new music studio using the cash from his job. While still able to maintain a mixed set release here and there, until leaving BSG in early 2007 and moving to London, England new solo track production and record releases would put off until the summer of 2008 after returning to Vancouver. During the time in the UK, DJ Lithium hit the local club circuit playing small underground venues and events after buying completely new decks and a mixer having left his own behind in storage in Canada. From 2007 - 2008 while in London DJ Lithium managed to pump out several mixed sets and was slated to release two of them on a sub-label of a major music group located in London. Unfortunately that sub-label went out of business and those mixes were locked up in a rights dispute for months. One of the mixes, "Off the Grid" did finally release directly from Black Tiger Recordings in late 2007 and quickly became popular worldwide. This mixed followed up "Stateless" which was released on Richmond Records in 2006 and still appears on iTunes and other stores for purchase. Once back in Vancouver and again working for the Syfy Channel, DJ Lithium continued to build out his own studio with the goal of releasing his own records that year. 2008 marked a release on Black Tiger Recordings by Dejan Subotin (BTR-011) and due to the collapse of the global economy would trigger a massive downturn in vinyl sales nearly collapsing Black Tiger Recordings in the process. Undeterred, DJ Lithium continued on with production efforts releasing extremely short run 12" singles of his own works. These are incredibly rare and went largely unnoticed due to the lack of distribution and short run numbers. These records were single sided white label releases and may have been on the TK-421 Records sub-label of Black Tiger Recordings with catalog numbers TK-421-002, TK-421-003 and TK-421-004 although this is unconfirmed. Apparently there were manufacturing problems with TK-421-003 resulting in a delay in its release. This happened before with the TK-421-001 release pushing it back over a year. There are no known releases on TK-421 beyond 2009. Having to relocate again to Switzerland in 2009 to work on the independent science fiction film production "CARGO" for 5 months, DJ Lithium played small underground venues in Zurich whenever possible. It is rumored that he played the famed Oxa dance club as a guest to a small crowd of less than 100 people on an off night shortly before returning to Canada in June of that year. With the global economic collapse affecting vinyl sales DJ Lithium became increasingly frustrated with the lack of vinyl releases by other trance labels and while still able to release new mixed sets regularly since that time by 2012 trance had taken a downward turn with practically no new records from other labels being released. Some long time fans of DJ Lithium say this has forced him to explore new genres as a DJ as well as a producer but this is not entirely correct. This transition away from trance is said to have started much earlier and began to come through in the mixed sets over the last 8 years starting in 2008 with "X" Disc One, Two and Three. "X" Disc Two specifically features several electro house/trance tracks mixed using the same approach that DJ Lithium has applied to all of his mixed compilations but is still considered to be a "trance" mix. That 3 mix series follows a pattern that DJ Lithium established years prior of releasing mixes that have themes to them in their naming and music style. In 2013 DJ Lithium decided to return to the United States and decided first on northern California, to take a break from the film and TV business. Prior to this he had worked for 2 years straight on Iron Sky in Finland for 2011 and then on another production in Vancouver for 2012. In the fall of 2013 DJ Lithium solo effort appeared on soundcloud with "Harvest Moon", a progressive trance track that surprised many of his followers and fans. In the spring of 2014, the "Hell Speak" EP (Catalog number BT-013) was released by Black Tiger Recordings on 12" and digital featuring 4 tracks; Hell Speak (Half-Breed Mix), Hell Speak (Demon Mix), Harvest Moon (Original Mix) and Harvest Moon (Earl and Majors Remix). The Earl and Majors remix was produced in the fall of 2013 by Earl Von Bye and Lee Majors, one of DJ Lithium's aliases to form the new project Earl and Majors. The record was pressed by Rainbo Records in Los Angeles and sold directly to Juno Records in the UK where it quickly reached number 1 on their trance record charts and stayed there for at least 9 weeks. From 2008 to 2014, Black Tiger Recordings had not released any new vinyl officially and for DJ Lithium this was too long. BTR-013 represented the first time DJ Lithium's name would appear on the label as a solo production 12 years after launching Black Tiger Recordings. Throughout 2014 and 2015 several new tracks would appear from DJ Lithium, released digitally on Black Tiger Recordings as well as Earl Von Bye's Mixed by Monkeys label. This would include another new project called the "Mars Resistance Front" which would quickly push out the tracks "Forgotten Realms" in the fall of 2014 and later "Heat Seeker" in the spring of 2015. In the spring of 2015 DJ Lithium again relocated but this time to Las Vegas, Nevada where he began building up a new production studio which was completed in the fall of that year. Once again joined by Earl Von Bye the pair would combine again under the Earl & Majors alias to complete the "Las Vegas" EP in 8 days while exploring the downtown Las Vegas arts district and Fremont Street area at night. The Las Vegas EP consists of 3 tracks with a 4th bonus track on some stores. These tracks include: Fremont, The Griffin and Boots n' Pants. The names are taken directly from their nights out in Las Vegas and is reflected in the artwork for each of the singles which can be found on iTunes, BeatPort, Amazon, etc., on both Black Tiger Recordings and Mixed by Monkeys. The fourth bonus track called "Get High" was largely written by DJ Lithium months prior. It remained unreleased until the Las Vegas EP appeared in late 2015. The Earl & Majors project musically is considered a massive departure for DJ Lithium in terms of style of material that he would DJ, and reflects more that of Earl Von Bye's DJing style from the last 6 - 8 years. In reality it has demonstrated the diversity of his production skills as well as personal experiences in clubs globally that are more house and techno oriented. The summer and fall of 2015 also saw the emergence of two additional solo tracks released on Black Tiger Recording and Mixed by Monkeys by DJ Lithium entitled "Zero Hour" and "The Equation". "Zero Hour' appeared first in early September and is a sub 130 BPM deep house influenced but still uniquely trance production featuring an incredibly and deep subsonic bass line and haunting piano melody. "The Equation" is a energetic peak hour trance track similar to that of the Mars Resistance Front release "Forgotten Realms" and another DJ Lithium track "Approach Vector" which appeared in mid-2014. The Mars Resistance Front project has gained attention internationally with promos ranking positively in terms of feedback from a variety of known and unknown DJs specifically in the EU. Another 12" vinyl release is expected in the early summer from DJ Lithium but may feature Mars Resistance Front tracks or remixes done under the Mars Resistance Front alias. To this day DJ Lithium remains exclusively a vinyl DJ and has ventured into playing more deep house and techno releases alongside trance tracks from various labels that are now defunct or moved away from trance in the classical sense. - by Madfish