DJ Zeus joins Music Evolves to break down the art of DJing as an emotional craft—where storytelling, timing, and crowd connection matter more than the gear you use. From mixtapes to club residencies, he shares how the right track at the right moment can transform a room and why no algorithm can replicate that human touch.
Guest: George Platsis (AKA DJ Zeus) | Website: https://www.djzeus.com/home.html
Host: Sean Martin, Co-Founder at ITSPmagazine and Host of Redefining CyberSecurity Podcast & Music Evolves Podcast | Website: https://www.seanmartin.com/
In this episode of Music Evolves, host Sean Martin is joined by George Platsis—known on stage and online as DJ Zeus—for a conversation about the art, the science, and the soul of DJing.
DJ Zeus brings a unique perspective to the turntables, shaped by a classical music education, years performing in Toronto’s largest clubs, and a deep appreciation for music that tells a story. From early days making mixtapes on cassette to manipulating multiple turntables live, he shares how his journey started with rock, shifted into dance music, and eventually settled into a world of layered soundscapes and emotional storytelling.
From Mixes to Soundtracks
DJ Zeus doesn’t just play music—he creates moments. He explains that making a great mix isn’t about throwing popular songs together; it’s about reading the room, responding to energy, and creating a journey. Whether it’s a club performance or a recorded set in Ableton Live, each mix is built like a story—with dynamics, tension, release, and emotion.
This philosophy carries through to how he uses technology. Instead of letting it do the work for him, Zeus uses tools like pitch shifting, EQ manipulation, and harmonic mixing to craft something that couldn’t exist without human touch. “If you’re not pushing the technology,” he says, “you’re not adding your own soul to it.”
When Technology Meets Feel
Zeus shares how today’s tools can isolate vocals, remix tracks on the fly, and even keep beats perfectly aligned—but warns that without intuition, timing, and feel, you’re just making playlists. The difference between a DJ and a playlist? Emotion. Surprise. Humanity.
He also reflects on two tracks that changed everything: Daft Punk’s One More Time and Cher’s Believe. One brought club music into mainstream pop; the other proved pop could crush in the clubs. Both used vocal manipulation in new ways and redefined the sound of their time.
This episode isn’t about nostalgia—it’s about remembering why music matters. DJ Zeus reminds us that great DJing isn’t just what you hear—it’s what you feel.
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DJ Zeus Website: https://www.djzeus.com/home.html
Sean Martin: [00:00:00] and you're very welcome to a new Music Evolves podcast episode. I'm Sean Martin, your host, where I'm very grateful 'cause I get to talk about something I love with somebody.
I love music with DJ Zeus. How are you my friend?
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): I'm doing good considering we're on take two of this since we had the technical snafu on it, and as I said, I'm scared where you're gonna take this. So I, I, I took the wheel a little bit there to let the crowd know that we too have technological issues when we try to
Sean Martin: there's always tech, uh, helping us and getting in the way, uh, sometimes. But, um, no, I'm, I'm, I'm always excited when my guests are scared where the conversation's gonna go. No, we're gonna, we're gonna have some fun today. Uh, you've been on the show before, uh, and ITSP magazine show, not the, not music of all.
This is a new, new podcast for me,
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): I
Sean Martin: we've been on
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): we're not, I'm happy that we're not gonna be talking about. Technology and [00:01:00] cyber. Today we gotta just talk about music.
Sean Martin: No cybersecurity today. Um, we're gonna talk about making music from music and making people feel and move and experience
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): happy.
Sean Martin: and feel happy, ultimately. Yes. I guess
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): that's why it's appropriate to wear this sort of t, this t-shirt. A cl a a classic, absolute classic.
Sean Martin: It is a classic. So
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): what do you want to know, my man?
Sean Martin: let's start, let's start here. So people watching, uh, see DJ Zeus, they heard me introduce you as DJ Zeus.
You're also known as George Plaus, uh, to some, uh, but DJ Zeus is who we're gonna talk to today. let's just start with that. Uh, how did that name. Come about. Obviously you're a dj, so that
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Oh, that.
Sean Martin: probably figure that out. Hopefully.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Uh, yeah, the, the name is very [00:02:00] much an inside joke that I did not come up with on my own, so I did not give myself this name, and without knowing the, the entire cast of characters that were involved, this is just kind of how it came out in a conversation amongst all of us. It was like if A, B, C, D.
And X, y, Z happened. Well, he's Zeus, and I'm Hercules, that's what other, other person. And we all broke up laughing and I became Zeus. He became Hercules. And those were just kind of like our childhood nickname, nicknames, um, middle school probably, or uh, early high school. And then when they started DJing, it just.
Since everyone would call me Zeus, it just seemed pretty easy to call it DJ Zeus. So I wish there was a funnier story for the crowd to be a part of, but that's, that's exactly how it happened.
Sean Martin: That's a real story. That's, it's rooted. [00:03:00] Rooted in childhood,
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Yeah.
Sean Martin: uh. Uh, uh, a name nickname, if you will, for, uh, from somebody who I, I presume, uh, appreciates you.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Yeah. Yeah. Um,
Sean Martin: So you, you, you carry that around when you, when you, when you carry that name, my friend. Um, so transitioning from Zeus to DJ Zeus, when did that happen?
Were you, were you always into music growing up or
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): always into music. Uh, I grew, grew up as a classic rock person, uh, stones who loved guitars, so like Stevie Ray and Clapton. Uh, originally from Toronto and for all the Toronto folks out there, they probably know Q 1 0 7. So I would listen to Q 1 0 7 as a kid. On Sundays they had the big. Classic rock show and, you know, I would pretend to be the, the mc dj [00:04:00] every once in a while I had a family, had an old little Zenith boombox, and I would record tapes like that.
So yes, music was always in my, in my and our lives. The, the transition to what you would call more club music. So like the stuff, uh, kind of happened. Because of actually the, the, the person who threw out the, the Zeus and Hercules things, I was never into dance music, didn't care for it one bit. And he got me into it.
And the more I listened to it, I appreciate it. So like, I guess by, by our standards today, it would've been called Euro dance. Uh, so. Think about like real McCoy first base. Um, oh geez. Uh, songs like Myorca, those were like [00:05:00] the late nineties by like loft, uh, uh, culture beat. But when I started researching a lot of these songs, 'cause I was starting to get into it, I noticed I go say some of these got like kind of a disco grief to them.
Sean Martin: Huh.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): And lo and behold you do some research on this thing as you know. It's all from samples, and then you start seeing like, Hey, these songs come from like, uh, sister Sledge or the, there's a great, uh, two disc set that I like. It's called Disco Fever. It's got 40 songs on there. It's got some of the best, uh, uh.
Popular disco tracks out there. Uh, and you just see so many of the new songs, new songs being in the nineties, were either redone or they were sampled. Uh, I'm sure a lot of your listeners have, uh, stumbled on this site. I think it's called Sample This, [00:06:00] and you can just drop a song in there or you could research a song and it tells you like where all the other different samples are from.
And that was a really cool time for, for dance music. Because we don't have the dos and the technology that we have right now. So people were actually using like good old fashioned samplers and chopping upbeat. So you know, you weren't gonna get a straight 1 28, uh, BPM that you wanted. It was gonna be a little bit choppy and loopy.
Uh, I think now when, when did one more time defpunk come out? 2000, somewhere around there, plus or minus a year. Um. Like for me, that's one of the all time best club songs. I, I'd even argue number one at the, uh, it could be a number one club song. 'cause it was a very important song to me between that and Cher's belief.
And we can talk about that
Sean Martin: Which, which song in particular around
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): uh, one, one more time by DAF Punk
Sean Martin: Oh, one more time.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): and, [00:07:00] uh, belief by share. And I'll tell you my theory on those two songs, I think those were two very pivotal songs for both the commercial and the club scenes. But you listen to the sample of one more time when you dissect it and people have dissected it.
You could find this on YouTube. It's just wild how they cut up this sample and re-pitched it. And it's all from an old disco song. So I got more and more into that music, and then I was making the mix tapes. Uh. For those of you who remember cassettes and we used to play them in cars. So what I, I always had the best mix tapes and then it started really like in high school from, uh, disc men.
For those who remember what those are, while we're really dating ourselves, uh, I had some. Piece of crap mixer, or I would use a piece of crap mixer, uh, like one of these Radio Shack four channel type things that, [00:08:00] you know, they were heavy enough that you could throw through the wall, but you, you listen to them for too long, the distortion destroys your ears and you just took up two little discipline to it.
And it was you. I had one headphones in one and headphones in another, and you couldn't beat match or anything on that. But it was still you. It was actually very much how, like the old 1970s, uh. DJs used to do it on these things. It's like you had your like moment to mix. Like the if and if you missed that part, forget it, you were done.
You'd have to wait like either to your next chorus or uh, you might just have to do that really awkward fade in, fade out. So, uh, and then slowly but surely got more and more into it. I stopped playing instruments. I played a lot of instruments and started playing my stereo more and. More and more, so that's that.
Sean Martin: so mix tapes, and I'm, I'm, uh, [00:09:00] hoping to get, get an episode lined up with, um, the, the founder and curator for the Mix Tape Museum. So that's gonna be a cool episode. Um, but creating mix tapes, it, I think a lot of people back in the day, everybody calls 'em playlists now, right? But playlists are a collection of ready-made songs,
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Mm-hmm.
Sean Martin: mix tapes.
I think what you're describing is a mix probably where you're cutting and splicing songs as well to create your own ongoing jam, if you will. Right. So maybe, maybe talk about that a little bit more. 'cause I think they're also DJs known for remixing. Not just playing. Not just playing and transitioning from song to song in a club, but actually changing beats and adding melodies and all kinds of stuff.
How much of that do you talk about that [00:10:00] whole creative process? I.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): So some of the technology that's available today, I wish I had 25 years ago. It's, it's become so powerful. And it's so amazing at what you can do. Like one of the uh, the cooler things that you can do right now, and this is driven, they call it ai. Sure. Be it ai, whatever it is. Machine learning is that you could feed a track into some sort of processing, and some of them actually do it live Now the live ones do have their limitations and you can start filtering out the drum tracks.
The instrument tracks the vocal tracks. And you know, for me, why this was like mind blowing was back 20, 25 years ago when I'd be in a club or I was making a tape. I would, for [00:11:00] example, wished I had the acapella, the vocal track of this so I could drop on this song or this beat. Acapellas were incredibly difficult to find.
Back then, you know, you'd have to get like an import vinyl or, and this is assuming they even existed and they didn't even exist otherwise. Your only real option was you take the existing track that's got its beats and it's got its music and you gotta manipulate your EQs to filter out and leave just enough of the track, and then you drop it on what everywhere else is playing.
The challenge with that is, again, technology didn't exist. Now you can retune stuff on, on the fly. I was just messing around, uh, with Ableton. This is an old feature, but I had never used it until recently. You can you
Sean Martin: you're changing the speed and tempo, it changes
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): [00:12:00] well, well, okay, so let's see here, here, here was the old thing. Again, if we're using these guys right here, the tech twelves. You could speed it up, but you speed up too much or you slow down too much. You get either the Mickey Mouse voice, the squeak, or you get that big groany thing when like your Walkman runs outta batteries and everything's playing slow. Uh, so you had to keep that in mind right now. Uh uh, back then. Excuse me, right now though, and it's been around at least 10 years, I.
15, maybe in some cases, but it's gotten so good right now. You can maintain tempo and change pitch or change pitch and maintain tempo. You can do that independently right now. So something that I've loved to do with the mixes that I've been making for at least the last 10, 15 years, and I, I do this mostly in Ableton right now.[00:13:00]
Is not all beat mixings pretty easy now. I, I don't think there's many people out there unless they're true like turntable lists that still beat mix by ear. You know, that that was, that was the thing. I used to practice sometimes four or five, six hours a night and it would sometimes be just the same songs going back and forth so you could get the beat mixing done.
Right. Um, now beat mixing, I think most people will just. Look at the number. They let the computers do it. They let the, the players do it. What I think is really cool is that you could do harmonic mixing, and that's such a change, especially like when you, when you have a large crowd, like when you do a step up, like a, like I like going up, uh, two semitones usually.
I
Sean Martin: that's to raise the energy of the,
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): that's, that's to raise the energy and in some cases. You can even do like a drop. Like I sometimes, like a, I like [00:14:00] doing a drop three semitone, you know, especially if you're going from a major to a minor. 'cause sometimes those keys are actually, uh, you know, uh, uh, are very close, closely related.
Like if you're playing in a, like a minor A with a C major, you know, those fit nicely, for example. Right. Uh, there goes my music theory. I'm sorry to anyone if I get these wrong. It's been a while,
Sean Martin: I was gonna ask, clearly you've studied something somewhere.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): yeah. I, uh, uh, I played a lot of instruments, uh, through middle school and high school.
Uh, I wanted to play the drums. Uh, my, geez, when did we do that? Was it grade six or grade seven? Grade seven. You started The strings were in grade six. Band was in grade seven, so I wanted to do band, which was, and I wanted to play drums. And my music teacher, very kind man. Not gonna name 'em. Uh, loved by many, just not, you know, you know, people can figure it [00:15:00] out at some point if they dig into history.
I remember the three people that auditioned for drums. I did not make it. He was like, kid, you, you can't play drums, man. It, it's, it's not for you. And it was a very big blessing in disguise. So it's like, here's your saxophone. 'cause that was my number two. Uh. Because I think they, uh, they felt mercy on people that a lot of people wanted to do percussion.
But if you can't do percussion, you know, you get your, you get the, your, your second instrument. So I ended up, I started with alto sax, but I played all of them. Uh, most of the time I ended up playing Barry, but some tender and some soprano as well. But, uh, eventually I picked up all the drums on my own.
There's guitar, there was piano when I was younger. Uh. And there was some trombone in there and some cello for a while, and, uh, it was primarily saxophone and percussion and piano and guitar and bass through there. So, uh, I certainly am thankful [00:16:00] for the 12, 13 years of classical music training that was there because it, it made.
DJing so much easier. It's like, some people would ask me, it's like, how are you putting these songs together? Like you would go from like a nine inch nails to Maximilian to an arm and van held into an ac DC. It's like they actually fit if you're picking the right songs and you're doing it at the right point.
Um, so, you know, there's like four different genres there. One place, another play that, uh, we, we basically had a no format couple nights. So it, it was nice 'cause you could. You could play a lot. Where other places I was like straight hip hop or straight house or straight trance. Now my preference is to play house in trance.
But uh, yeah, that, that background in music really helped because it helps you put different pieces of things that you think normally wouldn't sound together, go together. And there is trial and error, like man, sometimes you'll [00:17:00] put together stuff and it sounds like junk. Uh. Uh, going back to a moment where you said about like making the mix tape and putting it together, uh, I, off the top of my head, I see at least three different scenarios when making a mix.
So mix number one is a party. Again, these could be live or you can actually record them. So mix number one is party. Those, you kind of need to go to your climax real, real fast and sustain that climax, uh, because if you don't do it, you know the party's pretty flat right off the, the beginning. Scenario number two is your more traditional clubs.
And I wouldn't do like weddings or other sorts of parties like that. For me, it would be the some house parties, but I was primarily a club DJ and I enjoyed the places that had 1500, 2000 people. You know, I had regular [00:18:00] residencies in those. There you also have to be mindful of the business, so it's more of a gradual build up, go down, build up, go down, build up, go down.
So like why do you got this go down? You're thinking, well, you want people to go to the bar. Right. That's their opportunity. Uh, not only that, but they, back when people were more social and they did not have their social media there, that was where you would meet people. So you actually, you need that little bit of downtime so people can talk.
If everyone's on the dance floor all the time, the bar's not making money and people aren't, aren't, aren't, uh, getting together. Uh, and then you really wanna like end towards a climax and then you kind of have a cliff drop when you want people to leave the club and go home. Um. And then the third scenario for me is like the mixes that I make, and the best way that I can explain them is they're telling a story.
Sean Martin: Tell me more. Tell me more.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): So,
Sean Martin: something [00:19:00] you're feeling or something you're trying to get people to, to
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): sure, sure. It's a, uh, and you know, people have actually said that when they've listened to my mixes, they're like. They feel like I'm telling a story, so like you can, you can start off real slow and airy and kind of spooky, or you can like come out with like a Mike Tyson. Punch across the face and just get the energy going.
And then, like, there was a time, maybe about 10 years ago, I wanna say right now, uh, my mixes were very up and down. Like, uh, they, they would take you on a bit of a high, then they'd kind of bring you back down and then they'd set you right back up. Uh, there would be interludes in the middle. So like sometimes I was using like movie soundtracks in there.
Uh, 'cause you know, the.
Sean Martin: the word soundtrack was in my mind. Is it,
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Yeah,
Sean Martin: do you, are you, are you, maybe not a soundtrack to play with some visual, but a soundtrack for the, for the moment. [00:20:00] Do you, do you picture it like that or is it different? I.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): I'm re rephrase the question a little bit 'cause I'm not
Sean Martin: When you're, when you're putting this together, I was thinking soundtrack for the moment. Not a, not a soundtrack for a movie,
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): uh,
Sean Martin: a soundtrack. A story soundtrack for the moment.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Yeah. It, it, it, it's very much for, uh, for the moment in most cases. Uh, like is it sometime driven by mood? Yeah. I'm gonna tell you, sometimes I've sat down to do a mix. I feel like I'm ready to do a mix, and I'm like, man, it, it's just not happening. And other times I throw one together and it's, it's real easy and it's.
The way that I've been doing mixes right now, because I kind of know that they're gonna be out there for eternity for the little small fan club that exists. Um, it's more of a production than getting behind decks and playing something and [00:21:00] doing that. So when I, when I'll make a mix right now. At Ableton is my, Ableton live is my preference.
You know, there, there's a lot of great tools there, but I think when, you know, when you talk to most audio people, they kind of navigate to something that, that they prefer and that they like to navigate. So for me, there's Ableton Live, um, and I don't use clip mode. I use producer mode. And I got my templates out where I laid them.
You know, it's normally two tracks going on, but there's sometimes that like I'll be using like symbol effects or I'll be using different samples, different drums. Sometimes I'll have like eight different tracks going on for one short moment. Admit.
Sean Martin: Tracks with other sounds. Yeah.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): absolutely. Absolutely. Um, uh. I love using symbols. I love using sort of, uh, bass drops [00:22:00] and all that because they're, they're nice for transitions.
Uh, a lot of the music that's been made, I wanna say in the last 15 years, 20 years, and, you know, my emphasis on club music, I gotta say, is like from 1995 to 2005, like, you know, for me that, and if you narrow that. Even more from like 97 to 2003. I think tho those were like the, the peak years for club music.
'cause you see a lot of the stuff that's being made today is, is mimicking or outright covering that stuff. Uh, you could make pretty good transitions. Like for example, I was at a club. I wouldn't be bringing in symbols, I won't be bringing in bass drops or wobbly sounds or anything like that. That one was just straight up using the knobs.
And that was before you had your like one knob that you could just filter everything out. The, there were a couple of mixers at the time that I think like really [00:23:00] revolutionized club music and then you started to see that in, in, uh. Like mix tapes or productions or mixed CDs, commercial ones. Uh, so like there was the, uh, VESTEX PMC 55, if I remember that one.
The pioneer DJ M 500 was great, but like the absolute like game changer at the time was, for me it was the DJ M 800 Allen and Heath had their zone 92. And then there was another mixer that. It was fantastic, but didn't have the level, the control was, uh, the MP 22, I believe it was the rains, like you really noticed how good these mixers were from a sound quality and, you know, I'm, I'm going off on a little bit of a tangent right here, right.
IT clubs would spend a lot of money on the sound systems, but then they'd think to [00:24:00] go cheap on the mixer. Which I always said was a catastrophic mistake because you have, if you have a good mixer, and what I mean, good mixer, I'm not talking just about the gadgetry on it, like it sounds good. It's a clean sound that gets amplified throughout the rest of the sound system.
Now, if you have a great sound system, but what I would call a noisy mixer, which means distortion. And I had played in clubs like this is, you're amplifying the distortion and I,
Sean Martin: tired.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): it, it makes you so, like there were a few places that I played at, like every single night I would walk out with a headache because you had this underlying distortion that's just like, just going and you're not hearing it because like, you know, there, there's 120 jezebel's, like.[00:25:00]
Thumping your chest. Uh, but there were other clubs, and I don't mind saying this because the, this has actually been documented, uh, a club in Toronto called the Government, uh, and that's spelled with GUV. Funny story. Let your, uh, listeners go and figure out why that one was GUV and not GOV. It was one of the loudest places.
You'd ever go to, and it was one of the most phenomenal sound systems I believe, in the world. And as loud as it was there. You never came out with a headache after. And I spent a lot of time there.
Sean Martin: Did you, you perform there as well,
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Yeah. A couple, yeah, a couple times. I, I guess, spotted there. Never a residency that the, uh, props to Mark Oliver for running that place for almost 20 years.
Sean Martin: So let, let's talk about, [00:26:00] um, so you said when you're, i'll, I'll say performing and you can correct me if there's a different term for it. But, um, so there's recording mixes, there's performing.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Yeah.
Sean Martin: in the live performances. You didn't tap into prerecorded sounds or effects or music. Um, two questions here.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Yeah,
Sean Martin: first is, when did you, when you're recording, would you also create your own elements like keyboard, drones or beats or
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): yeah, yeah. The uh, the.
Sean Martin: I'll just use a sample.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Yeah. And for, for those listening right now, uh, Sean is not doing on effect on his microphone. His microphone probably fell again, so the mic check.
Sean Martin: Uh,[00:27:00]
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): There you go. There you go. See,
Sean Martin: probably
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): see, he was, he was just messing with y'all. He, he was putting an effect on there. Uh, yeah, there was a time that I would, uh, love to add different keyboards, different drums, different symbols on those were kind of like my go-tos there.
Uh, and I would definitely do those in, in some of the, call it the recorded mixes. I did not do that live. At least I think I remember that. Put it this way, I, I didn't do it enough to remember it regularly. Like the, the crazy stuff that I used to do live there was once upon a time where like I would throw up four turntables and you know, one would be playing like a, a hardcore tribal beats and the other one have on great baseline, and then you got your melodies and your main track.
Something going on there that, that was difficult. You know, doing four tra, uh, four turntables simultaneously, and it [00:28:00] was like two turntables and two CD players. That's difficult because unlike today, where you can get like that perfectly clocked sound, uh, there, even if, even if the song was recorded and had that perfect thing, you are using a turntable.
A turntable's not perfect. It's pretty darn close. But it's not gonna be perfect. The platter could be off, there could be a little bit of misbalance right there. Uh, the voltage on a CD player could be a little bit off, or like your sliders just a, a pin. So like you're, you're trying to dis discern all these sounds either in your headphones or if you're going through, through the main pa.
At that point, it's like, okay, you, the way that I would do it is I would pick one of those to be the anchor, and I'd make sure to match everything to that. And it would kind of even get hard too, because depending on the mixer that you were using, your sounds, especially like in your lower mid ranges, [00:29:00] uh, you'd phase out and, you know, you, you could manipulate the songs to put them just enough out of time that you would like cancel out like the heavy.
Uh, bass drum beat. So like you could be going boom, boom, boom, and all of all, all of a sudden you just phase it out a little bit. It's like, it's like, where did it go? Uh, so in the live performances, not as much. Uh, right now, the way that I like to do the mix is it's concentrate on two tracks and give them color with different elements, different vocals, different sounds.
I haven't been doing a lot of the keyboards lately. Uh, or, or adding extra sounds, uh, in that respect. But sometimes less is more. In fact, I'm, I'm going to suggest in many cases, less is more.
Sean Martin: Less is more. I [00:30:00] don't know. I don't know if I agree.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Hmm. The.
Sean Martin: but I don't, I do. I think there's a moment where too much is never enough as well. But,
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Oh, the, the I, I have certainly, I have certainly lived by the philosophy of everything in more duration.
Sean Martin: there you go. There you go. I wanted to, um, I'll, I'll mention this, this group, um, I came across 'em a while back now,
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Okay.
Sean Martin: they're called Casablanca with a KI don't know if you've, you've come across 'em or not, but.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): I know of them, but if you're gonna tell me to name any of their songs, I won't be able to.
Sean Martin: I think they've done some, some covers as well, but they have their own, their own, uh, original stuff too, but they're using a lot of, a lot of samples.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Mm-hmm.
Sean Martin: it's, it's two guys with a bunch of gear, pads and keyboards and, and turntables and who knows what else is in their looping machine. I mean, Synthes, it's all in there, I'm sure.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Right.
Sean Martin: [00:31:00] Um, and they're performing this stuff live and it's, it's quite incredible and it's following a lot of what you say in terms of of starting, starting soft or slow and building up and, and really, really getting the, the group moving. Um. Because some of the things you're talking about where if, if one thing's off just a little bit, you'll hear it and it might just be off.
But as you, as you go, it's gonna get further away. Some things will get further away and then it becomes a mess. So I'm thinking that there must be, and hopefully, you know, or, or, uh, somebody else will tell me that. 'cause you can sink sensitizers with, with clocks and things like that. I would imagine where the old turntables, you couldn't sink a lot of the
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): The sink was right up here.
Sean Martin: was in your ear. So, assuming that all exist, my question to you is with the technology. Does that, I [00:32:00] dunno, I forgot how to ask the question. Where, where do you as a human get involved with it? If, if basically you're setting it all up and sinking everything? And, and it's all there. It's not, it's not making mistakes and you're not necessarily pushing in mistakes.
It it be, it's basically perfect, right? Whatever, whatever perfect is. So where, where's the human element in that kind of scenario? In that environment, I should say.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): So I'm going to go back to an interview that I read. I think Paul Van Dyke could, could, may, may have been a video. And this is somewhere in the mid two thousands. I was a very late adopter to a lot of the digital technologies. For example, Serato were Ableton Live and I kind of thought they were cheating for a while.
Right. [00:33:00] And. O one of the biggest turning points. 'cause I love PVD. I still love PVD. I think he's one of the best DJs that's, uh, that we've ever seen. Uh, not only as a DJ but as a producer. Like he, he really revolutionized, I think, Transer trans music being able to go into that commercial side. And I still wanna talk about dap punk and share, um, the.
The interview went along the lines. I'm gonna paraphrase this because I always, he's, he really jumped on the Ableton Live thing and he started adding syns and keyboards and the pads. Uh, 'cause he's a phenomenal musician as well. And the paraphrase was, if you're not pushing the technology, you kind of are like cheating at that point.
And that, that kind of opened up my eyes a little [00:34:00] bit. I'm like, I'm like, okay, if you're just using it to mix two tracks and go back and forth, you just program the playlist more or less. But if you're pushing the technology, for example, changing pitches. Doing harmonic mixing, adding in different samples, adding in different loops.
Like sometimes like I'll like to stretch out a sound or, or do like very, very quick chops that like, uh, incredibly difficult to do manually. Uh, if you're pushing the technology, then I still think you keep that human touch. But if you're just going one song to the other. You're making a playlist.
Sean Martin: There we go. We'll, we'll push that out there and piss a lot of people off. I, I struggle with this as well, [00:35:00] and I'm, it's, I mean, in the few episodes that I've recorded for the show, it, it's come up quite a bit in terms of human interaction with technology. When is it cheating, if you wanna use that word. is it, when is
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): can, can, can I add to that? Sorry, I'm gonna cut you off for there for a second. Can I add the, because there was something that really revolutionized, I think the DJing space and that because it, it was because of technology and how if you rely too much on the technology and you, you lose that human touch, you, you.
You don't have that vibe. It was MP threes because prior to MP threes, a DJ had to make an investment, had to go out, buy CDs, had to go out and buy a record. So you had a library. I was part of a record pool and I dropped a [00:36:00] lot of cash on it. So it was an investment for me, so part of my scale. Or what I brought to the table was that I had the library, I had the tangible asset.
When MP threes came out, everyone started to have the assets. But did everyone become a good dj? No. In fact, it produced a lot of crappy DJs, and I have no problem saying that because. Having the tools and knowing how to use the tools are two very, very different things, and, uh, I'm going to be as polite as possible, even though at least 20 years have passed since this happened.
I, and remember DJing at one of the larger clubs, like in Toronto, a manager was kind of saying, giving me grief about some of the music that I was playing. And saying, well, you know, why don't you play this song right now? I'm like, this song doesn't go right now. You're not reading the crowd. And it was a very big [00:37:00] song at the time and said, manager was like, no, I, I think you should play this song right now.
I'm like, drop the cd, hit play. It's like Moses showed up dance floor just and. You saw the embarrassment on the manager's face and they couldn't explain it. And I was just like, please get on my DJ booth. This is why you, why you pay me. Uh, you could play the exact same song at two different points in the night and have totally different reactions.
There are such a variety of factors that, like, what's the crowd like? How do they feel? How much alcohol have they had? Um, what's the weather like outside? Uh, all these, these live [00:38:00] performances.
Sean Martin: Patrick's Day.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): So my, my third hated my third most hated night to DJ behind New Year's and Halloween. Um, the.
Sean Martin: Surprised it's not the top. I guess I can
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): No, no, no. New New Year's takes the cake.
You know, you, you get, you get all the special creatures coming out on, uh, on New Year's. Uh, that's reading the crowd. And I saw a lot of that happening when MP threes were going out. People had the assets, they were playing the songs, but they weren't reading the crowd. And one of my most important learning lessons on the DJ side, it's, uh.
Me and a couple of the, uh, the boys we got together, we promoted a party, we rented out a hotel ballroom and you know, we got a lot of people there. Put on a nice light show, a nice sound system. And Sean, man, the party was flat. It didn't go anywhere and I was [00:39:00] real angry, like, and this was the turning point for me.
It was the next morning. I said, but I played good music and it hit me right When I said that to myself, I played good music for me. I didn't play good music for the crowd. And that's when I, until you establish yourself as a brand, here's the business side and people know, for example, the zoo sound and they'll trust whatever I play.
I have to get them on board. I have to establish that trust with. With the crowd that like, okay, he's playing stuff we like, we'll react to it. And that, that's kind of where like when I wanted to try and use songs for example, that I thought were good songs and hadn't hit the market yet, because I would buy a lot of imports and I would follow the European charge because on the, the dance force side, uh, law, a lot of this stuff was coming out earlier in Europe.[00:40:00]
I would bookend a new song. With two popular songs in the moment, because I saw this was a Two Ways to Win. No, no way to lose situation. If they like the song, I know that's a hot song and I keep it and I put it in rotation, that's win number one. If they don't like the song, they go to the bar, they reload their drinks or they talk to someone.
So that's my natural dip right there. So that, that's the second one right there. But it, it's. Playing those large rooms. And I, I preferred the larger rooms. I did some of the smaller clubs, you know, the 100, 200, uh, uh, people. But I, my comfort zone was 1500 and up and it's a totally different vibe when you get 2000 people just throwing their arms in the air together.
It's, it, it's a totally different vibe.
Sean Martin: I bet. I bet.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Okay. I'm gonna, I'm gonna steal this for a [00:41:00] second and talk about the, the Daft Punk and the share thing, and then we'll go where you want. So why I think these two songs are incredibly important is because, first of all, they both used voc coating, which was pretty novel at the time, and that
Sean Martin: Very different ways. Right.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): V very different.
But from a commercial standpoint, one more time, demonstrated. That a dance club song could be a commercial success and shares believe demonstrated that commercial song could become a club success. Those songs crossed over and I think if it wasn't for those two songs, we wouldn't have had that like dance Club to commercial top 40 crossover that that we experienced during that time.
It was okay to crossover because of those songs.[00:42:00]
Sean Martin: And you, uh, so you you do that? No, I'm kidding.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): No, no, I, I, I, I will say that as far as I know, I was the second person in Toronto to play one more time. 'cause uh, I was tracking down this song. I know only of one other person in Toronto that played it before me, but I only know what I know. There could have been other people that played it before me.
You know that I, I've played that song to death, uh, and I think it's rightly deserved to be played to. You got one more time by DAF Punk. You got, uh, delirium Silence, the DJ TTO in search of Sunrise Mix. Like you, you just hear like the opening beat of that and it's like a 10 minute mix and you just, that's gotta be a Top 10 Club song.
Also, there, there's a couple out there, but I. I don't think you can talk about topical music. If you don't get those two songs in there.
Sean Martin: There you go. [00:43:00] Um, we're, we're. Coming up on time here.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Fine. Get rid of me. I've, I've babbled too much. People just wanna listen to
Sean Martin: No, no, no. They, well, of course that's why we're here. But I wanna, I wanna close with this. Um, it's kind of a, a, a peek into the future, either your own, uh, the DJ as making music. I know you, you sent, you sent me a link to some, some fun things you bought the other day,
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Yeah,
Sean Martin: um, or the future of. DJing, uh, and technology's role there, and any of that to kind of wrap us up
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): if I had a magic wand and I could go back to DJing for. Large crowds and
Sean Martin: with turntables.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): I'd even do turntables. Yeah. Oh, well, one of the new Deni, no pioneer turntables, uh, [00:44:00] because the tech twelves that got reissued again, but the new pioneer ones, they're so cool, at least from what I've seen, because you can control serato often with like a real 12 inch.
Um. But they also have the to arm. So you can drop a, drop a piece of vinyl on there too, and just do a switch. And the gut controls, it's like, oh, but I'd love to get my hands on those. Um, I think the technology's just gonna keep on getting wilder and wilder, which means there's going to be more people that are going to be able to become quote unquote DJs.
Uh, and they'll make fancy playlists. You know, kind of like how AI is fancy machine learning nowadays. Uh, oops, I said that out loud. My bad. Uh, so I think the technology's going to definitely allow more people to get involved. I still, [00:45:00] there is an art and an ear to that. Uh, like I mentioned that story about the, uh, the club.
Yeah. Uh, dropping the, the same song or dropping that one song at the wrong time and it just clears the floor. Uh, you gotta feel like you're a part of the crowd. At that point, you, you can't feel like you're playing for yourself. Uh, the mix is
Sean Martin: this, lemme
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Yeah.
Sean Martin: Certainly we get fed playlists or we, we pick a station and we're fed stuff that it thinks we want to hear.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Hmm,
Sean Martin: Kind of like a dj. Maybe it doesn't read the room. That's my question. Can, can there, is there something they could read the room and know what the right order of things you think will end up there? The, the Mak of [00:46:00] DJs,
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): gosh. Uh, there was a show.
Sean Martin: deep into a conversation of and then we'll then we'll want to go back to the, to the tech twelves in the vinyl. 'cause the other stuff sucks.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): there was a
Sean Martin: won't eventually.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): on on much, much music up in Canada, the MTV of Canada. It used to be called Clip Trip, and it would play songs from different parts of the world. Like it. It wasn't your regular rotation. Type stuff that you'd see on MTV or much music and the show was, at least I would watch it when I come home from clubbing 'cause it was on like at three, four o'clock in the morning.
I absolutely adored that show because it's music I would otherwise never be exposed to. And I found so many great songs that I either incorporated in mixes or just listened to myself. I. [00:47:00] When you take away that element of surprise, you're just listening to the same. I think that's why music today sounds so similar.
It the there, where's the, where's Pete Townsend going? Bra on It won't get fooled again. Like, you know, like you just hear that, which I do think is probably the best power chord A in rock music. And the best D chord in rock music is all down the line near the end with the Rolling Stones. Um. You. You can't make it that mechanical.
And if the AI is reading the crowd, as you say, if I understood your question correctly,
Sean Martin: Yes.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): is it reading the crowd or is it reading like an echo of what they've already been programmed by previous ai.
Sean Martin: Exactly. I don't know the answer.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Uh, I, I got, I gotta tell you, I, I, I would DJ some nights [00:48:00] and I would go totally out in left field. Like I remember one of the most hilarious parties, I, I say it's hilarious now, but it was like two o'clock. Club was going, uh, well leave the reasons why I felt like doing this. But I said, screw it. I'm playing Greek music tonight right now.
This is a club in Toronto, uh, young and Eglington, and I started playing Greek music and the crowd loved it.
Sean Martin: There you
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): AI have ever decided to do that? I'm probably gonna say no.
Sean Martin: Yep. Probably not.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): You gotta feel the room, man. You gotta feel the room.
Sean Martin: Exactly. And, and, and yourself. And if, and they feel you too. So, um, I'm sure part of it was how you carried them throughout the evening
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Oh yeah.
Sean Martin: allowed that to work. So, 2, 2, 2 things. One day I love discovering new music, so I'm, I'm grateful for, we'll call it AI or whatever, to. [00:49:00] Present things to me. I'm, I'm prompting a lot of times for something, but I'll, I'll look for the random in the response
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Right.
Sean Martin: latch onto. speaking of random, somebody told me the other night that evidently there, that the jukebox
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): The
Sean Martin: now, is now digital and remote, so you don't. Typically you'd go in and you'd put a quarter in and you'd play a, play a song, or 10 or whatever sitting in a place.
Now you can do that with your app
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Okay.
Sean Martin: and you can do that without being in the place. So somebody was telling me they, they're sending chapel row
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): I, I could see how that could turn into a mean joke real
Sean Martin: or so, uh, talk about random.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Yeah.
Sean Martin: You're, you're fed something by someone, but who knows? Maybe, maybe they like it. You never know.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Maybe they do.
Sean Martin: So I, I'm gonna say spontaneous, random. [00:50:00] Be creative. the room.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Absolutely.
Sean Martin: DJ Zeus, you're amazing, man.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Thanks my man.
Sean Martin: I appreciate you, uh, taking the time to sh to share a bit of your journey and experiences and, and, uh, I
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Well, if I ever get back into doing it full-time, and that's the thing, uh, I will be coming to you to help. Blast that propaganda.
Sean Martin: Yes. We'll do you, uh, do a show where you actually play?
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): Or I
Sean Martin: hoping you play on this one, but you're not gonna, you're not gonna
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): no, I'm not gonna play on this one.
Sean Martin: but, uh, perhaps there's a way folks can find in if, if there is, then we'll, uh, we'll put that in the show notes where they can grab,
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): DJ zeus.com and then
Sean Martin: go.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): navigate what you need to navigate and they can reach out to me through there.
Sean Martin: Fantastic. All right, George, I'll call you now. You're, you're, uh, you're a great guest. Appreciate you taking the time, my friend, everybody listening, [00:51:00] watching.
George Platsis (DJ Zeus): it.
Sean Martin: Uh, thanks for, thanks for joining us today and, uh, please stay tuned. Listen to music, create music, and, uh, enjoy it and we'll see you all in the next, uh, music evolves.