BIOGRAPHY

D-Rakkas spent his youth as a charismatic, party-starting DJ (“Rakkas”
is in fact a local West Indian slang term for “rockers” music that he  used to print on his DJ flyers to indicate his parties’ music policy).  The concept for South Rakkas Crew first hatched, though, when he moved to his current home base in Orlando, Florida to manage Riprock n Alex G Ent., a company that, at the time, was a crucial part of ‘N Sync’s production team.  There, D-Rakkas conceptualized SRC to satisfy his creative need to fuse his love for electronic music with Jamaican culture.  D-Rakkas’ first album, “Clappas,” quickly proved a major island and European smash, earing SRC the moniker “The founders of Electro-Dancehall.”  Jamaican and non-Jamaican audiences alike quickly grew to appreciate SRC’s talent for fusing hook-laden song structure with sound-system destroying beats.

XLR8R recently praised South Rakkas for their “boundary-pushing” powers: indeed, these futuristic rhythm killers can’t be held down to any one sound or style.  SRC can flex from Beenie Man and Bounty Killer one moment, T-Pain the next and then on to the likes of M.I.A., Lily Allen, Beck, Duran Duran, Justin Timberlake, Britney Spears, and Shakira – all of whom have been touched by South Rakkas’ edgy studio savvy.  It is this same approach that has made international DJ D-Rakkas such a sought after talent for clubs and festivals all over the planet.  He intelligently uses a mass of influences in his unique brand of Electro dance music production and seamlessly drops it in his sets:  Electro, Dancehall, House, Moombahton, Trap, Dubstep, old school Hip Hop, Reggae, etc., etc.

When beat king Diplo put out South Rakkas’ Mad Again and The Mix Up EP on his Mad Decent label, the blogosphere proved unanimous in its praise: Prefix raved about Mix Up’s “production perfection.”  The Washington Post gave it an extremely rare A+ rating, while Thom Yorke was dropping the Boy 8-Bit mix of “Mad Again” during his guest deejaying on Gilles Peterson’s BBC radio show.  Trip-hop titan Tricky chose SRC to remix his entire West Knowles Boy album, garnering rapturous press.

QUOTES

“When it comes to knowing what smashes a dance, few production outfits can match South Rakkas Crew.” 
--Pitchfork

“South Rakkas Crew make some of the most electrifying dance music on the planet.” --The Guardian

“South Rakkas Crew transformed it into a high-voltage electro and sublime space-disco monster.  In fact, Knowle West Boy is barely there, but something fantastic has appeared in its place.” -- The Independent

“a collision of exotic and intoxicating rhythms that dance around truly body-rocking beats, hammered and glued into forms that enthrall and excite… Tricky Meets South Rakkas Crew is an electrifying listen, invigorating the parts Tricky can’t usually reach.” – BBC

“On The Stimulus Package, the South Rakkas Crew don’t just throw down the gauntlet in dancehall, but kick open doors in dubstep and electro… South Rakkas Crew do everything on this album short of painting a sign that they are THE experimental force in dancehall music.... A superb body of work by  superb and veteran producers and remixers.” – True Genius Requires Insanity
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Born out of an era where Ridley Scott imagined dystopian futures on the silver screen, and artists like NIN and Aphex Twin rocked MTV.

Getting creative in the studio with the likes of Seven Lions, Skrillex, Deadmau5, and Tom Morello, and contributing to film scores and OSTs, including “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” and “XXX -Return of Xander Cage” in collaboration with top composer Brian Tyler, Stanczak's long standing career in electronic music never stands still.

The Partially Examined Life is a philosophy podcast by some guys who were at one point set on doing philosophy for a living but then thought better of it. Each episode, we pick a text and chat about it with some balance between insight and flippancy. You don't have to know any philosophy, or even to have read the text we're talking about to (mostly) follow and (hopefully) enjoy the discussion.

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