DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist Present

The Hard Sell 

DJ Shadow (born Josh Davis) is widely credited as a key figure in developing the experimental instrumental hip-hop style associated with the London-based Mo' Wax label. He worked his way through hip-hop's early years into the heyday of crews like Eric B. & Rakim, Ultramagnetic, and Public Enemy; groups which prominently featured DJs in their ranks. Josh "Shadow" Davis had already been fiddling around with making beats and breaks on a four-track while he was in high school, but it was his move to the NorCal cow-town of Davis to attend university that led to the establishment of his own Solesides label as an outlet for his original tracks. Hooking up with Davis' few b-boys (including eventual Solesides artists Blackalicious and Lyrics Born) through the college radio station, Shadow began releasing the Reconstructed From the Ground Up mix tapes in 1991 and pressed his 17-minute hip-hop symphony "Entropy" in 1993. His tracks spread widely through the DJ-strong hip-hop underground, eventually catching the attention of Mo' Wax. Shadow's first full-length, Endtroducing..., was released in late 1996 to immense critical acclaim in Britain and America. Preemptive Strike, a compilation of early singles, followed in early 1998. Later that year, Shadow produced tracks for the debut album by U.N.K.L.E., a long-time Mo' Wax production team that gained superstar guests including Thom Yorke (of Radiohead), Richard Ashcroft (of the Verve), Mike D (of the Beastie Boys), and others. His next project came in 1999, with the transformation of Solesides into a new label, Quannum Projects. Nearly six years after his debut production album, the proper follow-up, The Private Press, was released in June 2002. The following year Shadow released a mix album, Diminishing Returns and in 2004 he released a live album and DVD, Live! In Tune and on Time. In 2006 he released another long awaited full-length album "The Outsider," which featured rising Bay Area Hyphy rappers including Keak Da Sneak and E-40. "The Outsider" also featured a single with Q-Tip (of A Tribe Called Quest). In September 2007 Shadow released volume 1 of a 3 disc set entitled "The Best of the 4-track Era," a collection of Shadow's earliest recordings, this project is exclusively available through his web store, ShopDjShadow.com. In the midst of all of these solo projects, DJ Shadow collaborated with fellow hip-hop DJ Cut Chemist. Together created a series of mixes that fuse soul, funk, and rock, in the framework of a cohesive concept involving using only 45 rpm records (7 inches). These mixes include Brainfreeze, Product Placement, and The Hard Sell.