DJ Samer - Free Your Mind

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Soundscape
Sets the scene and paints mind-altering musical pictures with a diverse array of ambient, downtempo and cinematic vibes.


With 20 years of experience at the forefront of the underground scene, DJ Samer is to progressive house what strawberries are to cream: utterly essential! His label, Pangea Recordings continues to build on his legacy being charted and played continually by the scenes elite DJ. And the no signs of slowing down, DJ Samer is in the prime of his life right now.

Biography

Like many in the underground dance community, Samer Salhab’s musical journey began with a place: Club Simon’s in Gainesville, Florida. For the bright-eyed young music fanatic, Club Simon’s acted as a catalyst for his passion for underground House music, fueled by discovering a world of super talented artists and a new desire to collect their tracks and weave sonic stories of his own through DJing. After hard work and tons of practice, things started to come together for Samer. He left Gainesville for Tampa to finish his education but took his love for dance music with him. His growing collection of House, Progressive, and Trance began to form a style that became known in the local club scene in Ybor City - the center of Tampa's nightlife. There, his he began to catch the ears of club goers and he slowly started making a name for himself.

“It was tough making a name for myself where Florida Breakbeat was the choice of music at the time. I thank all the DJs that gave me a chance. They had total control and influence of what people on the dance floor were listening to and allowed me to try and have some small sort of influence over it.” - DJ Samer

Samer’s chance meeting with Bill Vines (The Maji) at Chakra Records, Tampa kick started his career into overdrive. Bill’s mentoring gave Samer a good grounding in production and DJing. They also set up Pangea Recordings. Working together as Evrydaydowers, they began to pick up gigs across Tampa which lead to them producing their first EP - A New Beginning. “Quality wise, this was a first production, but I remember receiving a compliment from Brother Brown at the WMC. Being that he was one of my heroes, that's when I knew we were heading in the right direction,” Samer says. The early 00s proved to be a very successful time for Samer but soon he began to look further afield at the bright lights of California. In 2002 he finally made the move to San Diego and slowly began to build his name in the local scene warming up for luminary international DJs. Aside from his own personal success, Pangea’s influence was further enhanced by the likes of Sasha regularly playing and charting their releases, indeed, Samer recalls a surreal moment at WMC 2003 where he heard Sasha drop “This World” (Pangea’s first globally distributed release) to a highly receptive Miami crowd. With the success of Pangea Recordings, Samer decided to expand Pangea by creating sister labels Pangea UK, 1Shot Recordings, and digital spawns for them as well. “The San Diego scene was pretty chill compared to LA and San Francisco, which allowed me to get a lot of work done and allowed me to release more records.” Samer says, “Also, I got so many great demos it was tough to stay focused on just progressive music. I needed another outlet to release other types of tunes, and that’s why we formed the sister labels.”

“DJ Samer has long been an influential figure in the United States progressive house scene. Never fazed by certain genres coming in and out of fashion, he has stuck with progressive sounds throughout and we salute him for that!”- Mitch Alexander (Release Promo, Canada)

Unfortunately, Samer and Bill have decided to take different paths in recent times, but this hasn’t slowed Samer down as he now DJing across the country at some of the best parties on the planet; from Ultra, Miami with Deadmau5, Sasha and John Digweed to Love Fest in San Francisco and beyond. These days, Samer is concentrating more on his original productions and writing music under his own name. He has signed solo outings and remixes on very well-respected international labels such as Spundae Music, Baroque Records, Old SQL and more. Samer’s podcast – Pangea Recordings Podcast - has aided him in pushing his sound to a worldwide audience with thousands of devoted and faithful listeners. It is safe to say that Samer is still one of America’s most exciting DJs and producers. 20 years in the making, DJ Samer is still that wide-eyed music fan looking forward to the weekend where his favorite DJs spin the greatest music in the World at Club Simons.