STM 122 - DJ Skirt

The author of the mix is Bethany DeMoss, publicly known as Skirt, an American DJ and electronic music artist, residing in Birmingham for over a decade. Bethany began her prolific DJ career in the late 1990s after she bought her first turntables. She has been mixing vinyl ever since, have played records in many notable places all over the UK and internationally. Tokyo, Berlin, Athens, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Dublin, Amsterdam are only few cities to mention where DeMoss turned the crowd on with her exemplary mixing skills and moving techno rhythms by her beloved techno producers like Surgeon, Regis or Function. Moreover, in the early 2000s DeMoss began producing her own music, but only in 2010 her first vinyl “In The Meadow Under The Stars” was released on then rising Horizontal Ground imprint. However, the last four years were amazingly productive and successful for DeMoss, she has released numerous of critically acclaimed records, mainly at the same Horizontal Ground and Sverca’s exceptional Semantica Records.

DeMoss personal creations are based on more dreamy, eclectic and playful sound structures than her powerful DJ performances mainly focusing on strict dance floor music. Almost all of her records are often accompanied by guest remixes and that always expands the overall record’s mood to the maximum. T++, The Black Dog, Shifted, Ancient Methods or Lakker are only a few respectable names in the ‘underground’ dance music scene with whom DeMoss in one or another way collaborated in the past years. Once, the legendary techno icon Surgeon stated “I enjoy all of her most recent productions the most. She’s really developed her sound and style”, and this is all true. DeMoss is constantly expanding her knowledge of creating music because every record she produces sounds more and more quality, dense and authentic, breaking any stylistic canons. DeMoss about her creative process in studio: “to me it's more like an art form rather than party fodder”.

Carefully read her insightful interview for Resident Advisor and learn more about her inspiring and picturesque musical path, transformative life experience, first DJ gigs in UK and how she met her musical coryphaeus at House of God event. She is sparkling with devotion and love for what she is doing and by constantly improving her sound’s quality, uniqueness and the whole ideological identity around her, DeMoss is exponentially going to the top of techno scene.

“Secret Thirteen Mix 122” does not need any vast introduction, because DeMoss just simply weaved mostly all time favourite records from her diverse vinyl collection, just to show more intimate musical background and to recall lovely sentiments of the past. This mix should bring back the listener to the times when DeMoss was living in the USA, recording radio shows to the tapes, listening to more New Wave and Industrial music, that definitely did a big impact to her as a person and as a musician as well. Tracks by the well-known and influential artists such as New Order, Cocteau Twins (her favorite band), Pink Floyd, Dead Can Dance or even Beastie Boys will leave no indifferent, because this is timeless music we all probably love and enjoy to listen from time to time. The smooth and thoughtful mixing of the tracks, subtle vinyl’s noises and euphoric overall emotion makes this mix so realistic, you can imagine sitting face-to-face with your close friend, putting vinyl after vinyl on the turntable and talking about music or art or whatever. And one more important thing, this is her very first-ever non-techno mix and that is why the whole Secret 13 is more than honourable to present it to you all.

I have really enjoyed doing a mix that was completely different to any others i’ve done. It feels great to share another side of my record collection and music I really love which has inspired me over the years. Most of these records are so old, but when listened they become completely timeless, lasting forever this way! I tried to convey this sense of timelessness in this whole mix, and to tell a certain story with the music as well.