Dieselboy - Career

Career

In 1994, Higgins created a mixtape entitled "The Future Sound of Hardcore," and sold about 100 through online LISTSERVs. "Through, people heard about me and I started getting bookings on the East Coast. It was a very slow process that eventually snowballed into my getting flown various places."

In 1996, at the request of Dan Donnelly of British drum 'n' bass label Suburban Base, Dieselboy mixed "Drum & Bass Selection USA." Dieselboy hired Paul Miller of Airline Industries of Washington, D.C., to design the art.

In 1997, Suburban Base had him follow up with 97 Octane, this time allowing him to submit track suggestions, resulting in a more varied selection. Todd Baldwin of Airline Industries designed the art.

In 1998, Nigel Richards gave Dieselboy full artistic control for his next mix-CD, 611 DJ Mix-series Vol. One (1998), for which Dieselboy did the graphics. Also in that year, Dieselboy made a mix-tape called Director’s Cut which he had packaged in film cans, his first experiment in presenting a dance mix in a quasi-cinematic framework.

In 1998, Dieselboy initiated Philadelphia's first 21+ drum 'n' bass weekly Thursday club night entitled "Platinum" at club Fluid, which ended on October 14, 2004. Platinum residents included Dieselboy, Kaos, Method One, Sine, Icon, Karl K, Mason, and MC's Dub2, Messinian, Armanni Reign, Sharpness, and Illy Emcee. It was rekindled in late 2009 featuring Mason, Sine and MC's Messinian & Sharpness.

In 1999, Dieselboy released his fourth mix CD, "A Soldier's Story" on the Moonshine label. The CD became the year's best-selling American D&B release. It opened with his first original “intro” and marked his CD debut as a producer with Atlantic State, a track co-produced with Technical Itch. Todd Baldwin of Airline hired an artist from Marvel Comics to design the art.

Also released on the Moonshine label was System Upgrade (2000). Justin Fines of Demo-Design designed the art.

2000 saw Dieselboy joining forces with Palm Pictures/Island Recordings and his releases The Descent, Invid, Render. The 6ixth Session was a double CD release on Palm Pictures, featuring a cyborg-themed mix described by the Washington Post as “hard-edged hyperdriven dance music,” which marked the beginning of Dieselboy’s VIP remix phase. The robotic album art was designed by graphic artist Akira Takahashi.

In 2002, Dieselboy founded Human Imprint, the drum 'n' bass imprint of electronic dance music label System Recordings. Human releases include Dieselboy's “projectHUMAN” (2002) and “The Dungeonmaster's Guide” (2004), as well as releases by a number of other artists.

For projectHUMAN (2002), Dieselboy presented a mix framed as a movie trailer, hiring Don LaFontaine for his intro and outtro. projectHUMAN was also Dieselboy’s first foray into remix commissioning, most of the tracks featuring American producers remixing UK and other international producers, and vice versa. Mike Young of Designgraphik designed the art.

In 2003, Dieselboy was invited by globally distributed DJ Magazine to create a mix showcasing American d&b entitled DJ World Series: D & B From The United States, on which he featured American producers Hive, Echo, Mason, Juju, Kaos, Karl K, Jae Kennedy, Stratus and Sinthetix.

For his next CD, The Dungeonmaster's Guide (2004), Dieselboy asked Peter Cullen, the cartoon voice of the Transformers’ Optimus Prime, to be the voice of the Dungeonmaster who narrates the mix. Again Dieselboy commissioned remixes, this time asking d&b producers from around the world to remix tracks by non-d&b dance music luminaries including Tiësto, Sasha, BT and Josh Wink. Dieselboy also released a triple vinyl LP pack featuring remixes by various artists such has Gridlok, Kaos, Karl K, Jae Kennedy, Stratus, and KC. Again, Dieselboy chose Akira Takahashi to design the album art.

In April 2006, Dieselboy released his first Human Imprint compilation, a 2XCD set called "The HUMAN Resource", which debuted at #14 on the Billboard electronic album chart. Disc One Selected Works, is a 12-song un-mixed selection including club anthems and VIP remixes from Bad Company UK, DJ Fresh, The Upbeats, Dieselboy + Kaos, Counterstrike and more. Disc Two Evol Intent Assemble the Monster features a continuous DJ-mix from Evol Intent, picked by Dieselboy to stitch together some of the best of the Human catalog, plus exclusive tracks and remixes from Gridlok, Infiltrata, Hochi, Vector Burn, Technical Itch and others. The album art was created by Dieselboy with graphic artist Joel Savitzky.

In May 2008, Dieselboy released his ninth major mix-CD Substance D (Human Imprint) which includes all exclusive tracks commissioned or licensed specifically for this project. CD1 includes remixes of Meat Beat Manifesto's "Helter Skelter" by Mayhem + Evol Intent, MSTRKRFT's "Paris" by the Upbeats, Adam Freeland's "We Want Your Soul" by Raiden, Computer Club's "Load Rocket" by Gridlok, Technical Itch + Kemal's "The Calling" by Evol Intent + Ewun, Dieselboy's "N/V/D (Zentraedi remix)" by Counterstrike, Demo's Trauma and "Cell" by SPKTRM, and Current Value's "Fear" and "Machine" by Demo, as well as Technical Itch's "Pressure Drop" and Counterstrike's "Timewarp." The vocal intro and outtro were done by Tom Kane, an Oscars announcer and voice of Yoda in Star Wars videogames. CD2 included unmixed tracks Dieselboy + Evol Intent + Ewun's "Midnight Express," Demo's "O.D.," and SPKTRM's "Machine March." In conjunction with this release, Dieselboy initiated the "Monsters of Jungle" tour with rotating Human Imprint label artists including Evol Intent, Ewun, Demo, Mayhem, SPKTRM, Infiltrata and MC Messinian. The psychedelic album art was designed by Akira Takahashi.

In July 2009, Human Imprint parted amicably from System Recordings. In summer 2010, Human relaunched with Steve Gordon of Steez Promo and Circle Management as new co-owner with Dieselboy, and they created the SubHuman Imprint for dubstep and electro releases.

Dieselboy tracks have been heard on MTV and ESPN, and in videogames including Gran Turismo 4, Amplitude, Saints Row, and Need For Speed.

Higgins has designed the graphics for T-shirts, logos, fliers and record sleeves for 611 Records, Breakbeat Science, Human Imprint, SubHUMAN Imprint, the Planet of the Drums, and the Monsters of Jungle, as well as for his former Philadelphia club night "Platinum."

At a New Year's Eve 2009 event by 3D Productions at Club 24 in Washington, D.C., Dieselboy played a 3-hour multi-genre set including dubstep and electro. The enthusiastic crowd response encouraged him to continue experimenting with this new format into 2010.

On January 31, 2011, Dieselboy released his first new mix in two and a half years, "Dieselboy - Unleashed!" (56 tracks, 73 minutes), as a free download on Soundcloud. In the first 24 hours it registered 14,098 plays and 6,122 downloads. On its one-year anniversary, January 31, 2012, Unleashed had logged 115,014 plays, 37,674 downloads, and 1,734 favoritings.

On February 6, 2012 Dieselboy released "Wake The Dead" a new 84-minute mix incorporating 87 tracks as a free download. In a January 2012 interview with Crowdnoize (Milwaukee), Dieselboy said of his then upcoming mix, "My goal is to make the most intricate, layered, and amazing mix that’s ever been done. Period. I’m not trying to just put out a mix; I’m trying to put out a mix that other DJs will listen to and aspire TO do. I don’t fuck around. I want to be amazing." The release statement further explains: "This isn't a rinseout of big rave anthems. This isn't a collection of his latest top 20 tunes. This is an archive designed to stand up to repeated listens, slowly revealing new sounds and elements over time. Taking a conceptual cue from The Walking Dead and referencing what DIeselboy feels is a definite 'bar lowering' of current dance/DJ culture, Wake The Dead is his effort to break boundaries yet again. Featuring almost an hour of heavyweight drum and bass and another 25 minutes of blistering dubstep from his SubHuman label 'family and friends,' Wake The Dead has more bass pressure than you can handle." In the first 24 hours despite initial server problems the mix logged over 16,000 plays.