U:Move

JT Quick and Brent Tactic Speak On A Club Sound Sweeping The World…And Here At Home

    Last summer, KC-based Brent Tactic began playing a new genre of dance music in area clubs called moombahton, a style basically born by the novel, now storied (perhaps accidental?) idea of Washington D.C.’s DJ Dave Nada, who slowed this down to 108 beats per minute at a house party in D.C. a couple of years ago.  Since then, the moombahton sound has appeared in features by both NPR and BBC.  Now, we’ve been following Brent Tactic’s moves since about 2007 or so.  One thing we’ve come to realize is that not only can Brent break individual club hits to unbeknownst crowds, but that he can break entire genres as well.  From the poppy to the gutter, just about any dance music trend to make a splash in Kansas City clubs over the past several years was probably pushed hardest by Brent and his cohort Ben Tactic (who now lives in Portland).  Moombahton is no different.  Consider Brent Tactic Kansas City’s ambassador to cutting-edge dance music.

    Through a mutual friend, Brent and JT Quick began connecting over moombahton.  “All credit due to Brent on this, he really championed the movement and the vibe speaks for itself. He’s good friends with my girl and they’ll talk music and then she will bang this (moombahton) stuff around the house they find. I was sold almost instantly,” Quick discloses. 

    Many know JT Quick as a radio DJ/personality on KPRS Hot 103, the city’s main FM hip hop station and even more have at least heard his voice at some point during his 15+ year tenure.  But still most of those people are unaware of JT’s affection for the quirky electronic music that you’d be more likely to come across on the iTunes Dance Chart than by skimming the city’s FM radio dial.  With dubstep, house and moombahton remixes available on (his soundcloud page), JT’s reputation as a well-rounded DJ is usually swept under the rug just as quick as you could change your radio station, or overlooked entirely. 

    About the music he‘s passionate for but isn‘t necessarily playing on the radio, JT says, “I think it’s a self-defense mechanism that keeps me from getting burned out. I was always the hip hop guy that took all my backpacker friends to raves. I think it’s only in the last several years that I found my varied musical tastes acceptable in a commercial setting like a club.” 

    With 2011 being bigger than dubstep and causing many of us to face-palm at most of the annoying beats we downloaded in years past as we search our 2010 folders out of curiosity, moombahton is a swift kick to the nuts of a sound that we’re still not exactly sure how to dance to.

    Cruising in at about 108 beats per minute, moombahton can contain the energy and build-ups of big-room house or trance, the wild style of reggaeton, and the fun disco feel of decades before.  It hovers right in a “mid-tempo” range that DJs have been searching to fulfill for years, a perfect pace for kitchen sink-style DJs longing to link slower tempos with faster ones.

    “The listener doesn’t really notice it but it puts the DJ in a great position to play remixes of familiar songs from just about any musical genre that can strike a chord with their audience no matter what their likes are,“ JT says.  “Added bonus, it’s a very easy style to dance to.”

    Brent Tactic elaborates, “I’m definitely not mad at how much girls seem to like it. Get them on the floor and before you know it, everybody’s dancing.”  Dancing is something that moombahton has definitely been known to incite, even in the genre’s infancy.  And lots of it.  One of the most influential moombahton artists out, David Heartbreak (Brooklyn/NC), smashed The Union of Westport just last month with what was the most fun, most successful party that venue has seen yet.  KC’s own Shaun Duval (aka Steez Harvey) and Brent Tactic played as openers.  Seriously, they’re probably still cleaning up from that party.  Even JT Quick is playing heavy doses of moombahton at Luna in the Crossroads, possibly Kansas City’s most upscale club at the moment.

    But as JT mentioned earlier, look to Brent Tactic as a game-changer in KC‘s dance venues.  Brent gave us some significant insight as to the future of moombahton-related events he has cooking in KC for the rest of the summer, post-Heartbreak.  “I’ll be playing a lot of it again on July 16th at The Union with Steez Harvey, Flashdance Gordon and cQuence. Beyond that, there are some pretty incredible things in the works. I’ll be jumping off a moombahton monthly at Luna starting August 26th.”  He couldn’t really elaborate at the time, but let’s just say that one of moombahton’s pioneering DJ/producer acts might be landing in KC soon.

    From a music industry guy’s perspective, JT Quick spoke on moombahton’s crossover potential that could smack us upside our heads before we know it.  “Moombahton most certainly has crossover potential but we will likely hear that happen in a very stripped down capacity. Nothing as edgy and crunchy as what current moombahton sounds like. Probably something in the moombahsoul flavor is more likely. But yes, it will happen and pretty soon I suspect.” 

    With various offshoots already rippling in their own directions out of the greater moombahton splash, one thing’s for damn sure.  Moombahton will not put you to sleep.  At least not as long as these guys keep banging it out. 

  MOOMBAHTON by T&ARecords

JT Quick’s Moombahton Chart [July 2011]
Munchi - Pun Ain’t Dead
Mu-Gen - Fizzdom (Munchi Moombahton remix)
DJ Ammo & Dillon Fancis - Westside (Moombahton Edit)
Heartbreak - Style & Grace
Dillon Francis - “Masta Blasta”

Brent Tactic’s Moombahton Chart [July 2011]

1) Billy The Gent & Longjawns - Vibrate
2) DJ Melo - Topless Riddim
3) Nadastrom & Heartbreak - Church
4) Steve Starks - TTFBO
5) Tactic - I Don’t Want To Be Right

Written by Chris Mills