THE LONG
VERSION.
The music started with a guitar. The DJ career started in a basement that hosted weekly after-hours. Both have been true since he was a kid, and only one of them paid until he got the two of them onto one stage. This is the part that did not fit on the homepage.
Where it started
The music started with a guitar, sixth grade. The DJ career started freshman year of college, playing sing-along songs in a dumpy basement that hosted weekly after-hours, under the name DJ Smurf. Then an internship at B96. That is the version of him Chicago learned. He was early on Euro and progressive house in the Midwest, back when most of the country had not worked out what those words meant. The CDs moved car to dorm to club. Off the Wall Europa. Progressive Series. Euro Daddy. Bass Beats and Melody. Mixmaster Throwdown formed in 1997. The catalog has not stopped since.
World one: the booth
Eleven hundred Street Mixes as a B96 Mixmaster from 2000 to 2012. Every week, 1.3 million people. First place at the Super DJ Spin-Off in Las Vegas in 2001, at RA Nightclub inside the Luxor. Multiple years in the Chicago Bears' exclusive DJ chair, plus warm-up sets for the Bulls and the Luv-A-Bulls. Halloween Bash and Jingle Bash at Allstate Arena for over a decade. Opening sets for Kanye West, Justin Timberlake, Black Eyed Peas, LMFAO, Rihanna, Run DMC, LL Cool J. Three weeks in Japan for the U.S. Armed Forces in 2009. Through every year of that he was also playing guitar. It stayed out of the show because running a set and playing a guitar were still two separate jobs.
Tinley Park, 2003. Toyota Park, 2009.
Summer Bash, 2003. Tinley Park. He carried a guitar out over his own DJ set for the first time. He had been playing since sixth grade. He says it sucked.
Summer Bash again in 2009, this time at Toyota Park. Twenty-five thousand people, two decks and a guitar, and that time it landed. Nobody else in that format was doing it, and it was the first time both worlds were the job at the same time. It has been in every set since, and it runs through every Bass Beats and Melody record. He writes and produces too. The original "Let Loose" closes out Bass Beats and Melody 2026, with his guitar on it and live drums by his son Daniel, age 12, who performs as Daniel Jaxon.
World two, out loud
Tech house, played the way Chicago taught it. Frankie Knuckles built the sound at The Warehouse, and the radio mixers carried it to a million car stereos. Dan was one of them, a B96 Mixmaster from 2000 to 2012. His sound now sits as a blend of David Guetta, John Summit, and James Hype. Guitar phrasing that owes a nod to John Mayer and Jimi Hendrix, arena attitude that owes Van Halen (Hagar-era), grit lifted off Nine Inch Nails. The guitar is played live over the mix, not sampled into it. He will still drop Metallica into a club set and make it work.
The other eight companies
Studios. A label. A print shop. Acoustic panels. Studio hardware. A software platform. Each one started because the thing he needed did not exist at the quality he wanted. Building the room, the record, the gear and the software from scratch, one at a time. The list is on the ventures page.
Chicago
Still here. The studio works online and ships worldwide. Clubs, festivals and press go through the contact page. The new mix is on the music page. The back catalog is on the discography page.