The Ninja Party is the most prestigious party of the annual DefCon hackers' convention, held in Las Vegas every summer. This was the eighteenth year for DefCon (and the third that I've played at it). Estimates for the number of people overall at DefCon vary, but reports are usually between about ten and twenty thousand attendees. The Ninja Party, however, has strict limits on attendance. Only one thousand "badges" are given out, and the badge acts as an official party invite. Each badge is also allowed a +1, so in theory, two thousand people should attend the party. tProphet (one of my good friends, who set up the sound system and show) and I didn't use our +1's, but probably every other one of the 998 badges did, so attendance was probably just shy of two thousand people.
The party was held at a boutique hotel just off-Strip, and since it hadn't yet opened to the public, the Ninja Party was sort of its christening. I played in a large open courtyard, with swimming pools. The shuttles that were taking people from the Riviera to the venue were mobile parties in themselves. When I climbed aboard, someone was dispensing vodka from a large pesticide spray container directly into peoples' mouths. The party itself was open bar, and playing in the warm weather under the skyline of the Strip was pretty surreal.
Here's a photo of my "badge." The badges were pretty high-tech (after all, it IS a hacker's convention), and change from year to year. This year's badge featured a sort of D&D type multi-user game, with the badges communicating with other nearby badges via wireless. Characters could fight each other, or solve challenges or go to certain locations to fulfill a set of ten goals. I saw one of the badges listed on eBay (lame) before the party for $2,000.
Here are track listings from the set:
01. Matteo DiMarr feat Dashka - Blower (Original Mix).
02. Laidback Luke feat Jonathan Mendelsohn - Till Tonight (Bolivia's Edit).
03. Philip Whirlpool - Time Has Come (Bolivia's Edit).
04. EDX - Thrive (Bolivia's Edit).
05. Victor Del Guio - Americano (Bolivia's Edit).
06. Bolivia - Highway 22 (Ninja Party Instrumental).
07. Peter Punck - The Mix (Bolivia's Edit).
08. Maurizio Gubellini feat Mia Crispin - Getting Personal (Bolivia's Edit).
09. Adam Beyer - Filthy Lobster (Bolivia's Edit).
10. Nick Muir & John Digweed - Tangent (Bolivia's Edit).
11. Stefano Noferini - Ghuroom (Bolivia's Edit).
12. Quivver - Boom Boom (Original Mix).
13. Phunk Investigation - Dark Floor (Bolivia's Edit).
14. Harry Choo Choo Romero - Phuture (Bolivia's Edit).
15. Saints & Sinners - Pushin Too Hard (Bolivia's Edit).
16. ALCA - Calling Africa (Bolivia's Edit).
17. Kid Culture & El Mundo Satori - Around You (Bolivia's Edit).
18. Mark Knight & Wolfgang Gartner - Conscindo (Bolivia's Edit).
19. Crazibiza - Spinning Around (Bolivia's Edit).
20. DJ Chus & Gonzalez Gonzalo - One Night In Havana (Bolivia's Edit).
21. DJ Josh Blackwell & Miss Babayaga feat Rachel - Professional Widow (Bolivia's Edit).
22. Peter Brown - I'll House U (Bolivia's Edit).
23. Spencer & Hill - Housebeat (Bolivia's Edit).
This mix can be downloaded as part of an archive of all 28 of DJ Bolivia's available recordings of live shows, from the following Google Drive link:
The recordings are compressed as a RAR archive, which can be opened natively in Windows. If you're using a Mac, you can use a free utility to open the RAR (popular examples are "The Unarchiver" and the "UnRarX" app). The password to open the archive is simply 'bolivia' and the size of the download is 5.6 gigabytes. If you have problems downloading this archive from the above Google Drive link, you can email DJ Bolivia at djbolivia@gmail.com for an alternate download link.
Additional information about finding any of DJ Bolivia's older mixes can be found at this link:
Thanks for your interest in these old historical mixes!
Overall, I was really happy with the set, and the venue and event was incredible. The first half hour was pretty good, but after that, I felt like everything was flowing better than any other show I've ever played. Here's a couple of photos that Pinguino took at the event. You should be able to click on either photo to go to the full photo gallery, or click on the direct URL link below:
Penguino's DefCon 18 Photo Gallery:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/pinguino/4865105991/in/set-72157624667002016/lightbox/
Follow Jonathan Clark on other sites:
Twitter: twitter.com/djbolivia
SoundCloud: soundcloud.com/djbolivia
YouTube: youtube.com/djbolivia
Facebook: facebook.com/djbolivia
Main Site: www.djbolivia.ca
About.Me: about.me/djbolivia
Music Blog: djbolivia.blogspot.ca
MixCloud: mixcloud.com/djbolivia
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