A few random reactions to the big Axis thread. Techno is big in Europe, and small in the US. That isn't likely to change; there's something about dance music that people in Europe just 'get' in ways that Americans by and large do not. Techno requires a completely different sort of listening than, for example, Trisha Yearwood. Most Americans hear techno or house music and don't even hear what you or I might hear. My brother -- who plays violin, and listens to jazz, classical music, and random pop music -- came to see me DJ once and to him it was 'loud, and it all sounded the same.'
In Europe they didn't burn disco records in stadiums in 1979. The idea of going out to dance to someone playing records goes back nearly 50 years. In the US, dance music is something homosexuals and weird looking kids are into. Dance music is perceived as being all about drugs. Europeans might fret about kids on E at dance parties, but without the reflexive Calvinist twitch that Americans are heir to. In the US, people seem to have trouble distinguishing the DJ from the drug dealer. Without presuming to speak for Mr. Mills, I think three things drive him -- the desire to make a living and provide jobs for the people at Axis, the desire to communicate through DJing, and the desire to create art in the studio. I think the reason that he hesitates to perform in the United States comes down to it not being worth the trouble -- there are vanishingly few clubs and promoters that work professionally on the same level with the people in Europe and Japan. Is it really worth it for him to put up with the drama surrounding the scene here? If you had the opportunities to work elsewhere at the level he does would you bother? I think on the occasions that Mills is actually in Chicago, he's here to take care of business, make music, and chill out. He enjoys a certain anonymity in Chicago he doesn't have elsewhere; he can live and work there without being hounded by fans. I don't imagine playing out in the sketchy Chicago scene and raising his profile in town is high on his agenda. And as for record prices -- whatever. Vote with your feet. I know a LOT of DJs who drop big bucks on records all the time. Bitching about record prices is pretty lame. Until you try and manufacture and market records yourself, and understand how marginal a business it really is, you don't really have any room to talk. Either buy the record or don't buy it.
