Thirty Years of Cutups, Split Seven Ways

I’ve been DJing as Cutups since 1996 — thirty years this year. The name comes from the cut-up technique of Brion Gysin and William S. Burroughs, which felt about right for what I was doing to records at the time and, honestly, still does.

The problem with thirty years is that it doesn’t compress. When a promoter asks “what do you play,” the honest answer is a list long enough that it stops being useful. A goth night doesn’t need to hear about footwork. A drum & bass promoter doesn’t care that I’ve played the Warhol. So I sat down and split the whole thing into seven areas, each one able to stand on its own.

What follows is that breakdown. Each section has the short version, the credits that matter, and at least one mix you can actually put on.

The spine

The parts that show up in every version, regardless of genre.

The seven areas at a glance

1. Drum & Bass / Jungle

Pittsburgh jungle and D&B since the 90s — FUZZ resident, 412DNB.

I came into drum & bass through the late-90s rave scene as a fan and never left. Being a regular in the jungle room at raves, into SCJ led to me buying lots of records and spinning them on college radio, PBS throwing events with lots of jungle and D&B. Played the weeklies at Balance, Java and MUSE, then in 2000 joined the crew that started FUZE at the Bloomfield Bridge Tavern — a Polish dive bar that had never previous hosted electronic music. It became FUZZ in 2004 and ran as a Wednesday weekly until January 2014. Out of that first year the 412DNB crew came together, with every dollar of the door going back into bookings instead of pay.

I was a resident across the full run — opening sets of 92–95 classics, ragga, intelligent and technical selections — and handled a share of the booking, promotion and graphics.

• Sound: classic jungle and 92–95 hardcore · ragga and rollers · jump-up · atmospheric · deep and technical · halftime and 160 hybrid
• Opened for: Shy FX, Andy C, Noisia, Ed Rush, Dieselboy, Klute, Bailey, TeeBee, Fanu, DJ SS, Seba (and many more)
• Beyond the weekly: LAZERFUZZ with Dieselboy and Xanopticon (2007) · DEEP JUNGLE with Shy FX (2007) · Konkrete Jungle Pittsburgh (2008) · 412DNB takeovers at Mr. Smalls and Tiki Lounge · the 412DNBBQ family picnic · FUZZ revivals in 2016 and 2023 · Roots Sessions · Drum & Bass Night at Government Center

Listen: Burndown — jungle, footwork and 160 · Bloomfield Flowers — D&B anthems, for the ten-year anniversary of FUZZ ending · It Just Came Alive — 94–95 raggamuffin jungle · Red Rush — a 2002 promo mix for FUZE

2. Bass Music & Club

Co-founder of LAZERCRUNK — eighteen years of Pittsburgh bass music.

LAZERCRUNK started in June 2008 when a night opened up at Brillobox, growing out of the StackinPaper one-offs Keebs and I had been throwing since 2007. The brief has never changed: fun, mashed-up, forward dance music, with guests doing the same.

First Thursdays 2008–2013, second Fridays 2013–2017, split between Brillobox, Belvederes and Spirit 2017–2020, periodic since. Over 150 editions and eighteen years — plus the recurring theme editions (VHS Party, Shark Week, Adventure Time, Cookie Table, Time Travel, Ghibli, Monster Truck Rally).

• Sound: UK garage and 2-step · dubstep old and new · grime · footwork and juke · jungle-tempo bass · club and ballroom edits · halftime · bassline
• Hosted / opened for: Kode9, Bok Bok, Loefah, Ikonika, Roska, Swindle, Plastician, Hatcha, Distance, Madam X, Kingdom, Traxman, Mary Anne Hobbs, Switch, Kaytranada, Diplo
• Related: thirteen years of dubstep and grime programming inside FUZZ · CHUFF! and Next Step (2007–08) · frequent guest at 2 Step Tuesdays at Tiki Lounge since 2016 · Cobra takeovers · Boiling Point, Highline Remixed, Blacktop · guest spots for Cleaner Tapes / Misophonia, SubSanctuary, Elixr and Side Quest

Listen: Saturday Session — two and a half hours across the whole bass spectrum · Reload Ting — UKG, bashment, grime, bassline · Wild Haze — 140 wave, grime, dubstep, garage · Blacktop Vol. 3 — footwork, juke, jungle and soul · Blast Off Vol. 7 — recorded b2b with Keebs opening for Shades & Ivy Lab

3. Breakcore & Experimental Hardcore

Breakcore since 2001 — founder of the Wrecked distro.

This is the thread that runs furthest back and travels furthest from home. I founded PBS in 1997 to pull noise, experimental and live acts into the rave scene, and in 2001 started Wrecked — an online mailorder and distro built to circulate music that was otherwise impossible to buy in the US. The same banner went on the shows.

From 2001 to roughly 2012 I was a regular travelling name on the Midwest/Northeast hardsound circuit, and throwing breakcore shows in the burgh. I’m still programming it now through BxC Collective and Cleaner Tapes / Misophonia.

• Sound: breakcore and mashcore · digital hardcore · flashcore and speedcore · drill’n’bass and braindance · powernoise · amen-driven chaos
• Out of town: Breakcore Gives Me Wood w/ Venetian Snares (Brussels, 2008) · Darkmatter Soundsystem (Los Angeles, 2004) · Sickness w/ Venetian Snares (Brooklyn, 2004) · Rugged Nymphomania (Philadelphia, 2006) · Ultimatum 3 and 7 at Killtime (Philadelphia, 2001) · Altered Beats (Toronto, 2004) · Zhark Domination (Detroit, 2005) · HYDRA (Mexico City, 2011) · Monster X (San Francisco, 2012) · Habitat (Cleveland, 2021)
• Shared bills with: Venetian Snares, Doormouse, Enduser, Drop The Lime, Hecate, Baseck, Aaron Spectre, Otto Von Schirach, Xanopticon, Drumcorps, The Flashbulb, Machine Girl

Listen: Terminal Atroxity — splatterbreaks, breakcore, braindance, acid · Fortean Crimes — recorded for the JAGOFF UPRISING box set, THAC0 Records, 2006 · Flesh Lathe — new hard sounds from the underground · Coughing Up Blood — dark ambient into rhythmic noise into breakcore, 2001

4. IDM & Left-field Electronics

Twenty-five years of promoting and playing left-field electronics.

This is the least documented of the seven and the one that shaped the other six most. I’ve been buying, promoting and playing left-field electronics since the late 90s — Warp, Planet Mu, Rephlex, Hymen, Schematic, and more recently Analogical Force — and started the Wrecked mailorder in 2001 in large part because none of it was reliably available here.

Where it actually gets played is long-form: warm-up and lobby sets, gallery and museum work, early slots before a harder headliner. Anywhere there’s room for downtempo, ambient and beatless material alongside the rhythmic stuff.

• Sound: IDM and braindance · drill’n’bass · downtempo and ambient · electro and electroacoustic · glitch · dub techno · leftfield beats · modular and hardware-driven electronics
• Programming: IDM showcases at Wood Street Gallery (2005) and Punish Your Machine (2006) · the “Circuits of Steel” local producers showcase with Xanopticon, Shawn Rudiman and Ctrl Alt Del playing live · Icepickk at the Mattress Factory · DIY Electronics Hackfest · laptop battles · ongoing programming through BxC Collective
• Shared bills with: Richard Devine, Phoenecia, Machinedrum, The Flashbulb, Daedelus, Gridlock, Thavius Beck, Cale Parks, Xanopticon, Majeure, Cloning, Timeghost, Balam Acab, oOoOO, Shawn Rudiman, Ctrl Alt Del, Prometheus Burning

A caveat worth stating plainly: most of this happened as promotion, distro work and opening sets rather than headline bookings, so a show list undersells it badly. It’s the area I most want to build back out.

Listen: Whoomp IDM — the first CDR mix I ever recorded, 2001 · Just Floating — trip-hop, shoegaze, dub and ethereal downtempo · Wintermute — 107 minutes of cyber-grime and mutant technoid · Almost Summer — downtempo, hip hop and IDM, 2002

5. Dark Dance

Dark dance in Pittsburgh since 2001 — ILLUSIONS, Coven.

I’ve been a fan of dark electronic music forever, going back to a strong affinity for science fiction and horror soundtracks, and specifically John Carpenter’s soundtracks having a strong latent influence on my taste. In the 90s, as many, I discovered Skinny Puppy on alternative radio, which led to Coil, and the Vampire the Masquerade handbook lead me to lots of other gothic sounds, reading zines led me to TOPY and PTV. When I started DJing on college radio at Pitt, a big part of my radio show was harsh electro industrial of the time (mid-late 90s). Different threads of music pushed my djing more towards other genres for a while, but I was still regularly going to goth scene events through the 90s and early 2000s, and eventually I found different ways to bring in flavors of goth, industrial, ebm, etc.

I guested at Ceremony, Pittsburgh’s long-running goth night, at Laga in 2001 and again at Pegasus in 2007. A group of friends had a short-run series called BURNING CHROME that focused on oldschool industrial and noise, and some of us soon after conceptualized a new night.

ILLUSIONS began in 2010 as a collaboratively curated night with Vaneck and Tella, built to present dark music as a full event rather than a straight club night — live acts, DJ sets, video and multimedia together. It ran at Cattivo, Brillobox, Spirit and Garfield Artworks through 2014 and has surfaced periodically since, most recently in 2025 with Light Asylum, Heavy Halo and Lilac/Web at Spirit.

Around it: a Coven residency at Belvederes (2018–19), Darkwave nights at Gus’s Cafe, and DJ slots at Evolution, Killing Moon, Midnight Veil, Tainted Love, Brutalism, Penumbra, Voodoo, Release The Bats and Night Warp.

• Sound: post-punk, deathrock and goth · coldwave and minimal wave · darkwave and synthpop · EBM · new beat and industrial dance · dark italo · occult and industrial techno · witch house · synthwave · haunted pop
• Opened for: ADULT. (three times), Perturbator, Boy Harsher, Container, HIDE, Gost, Dance With The Dead, Youth Code, Xeno & Oaklander, Martial Canterel, Light Asylum, Kontravoid, Soft Metals

Listen: Cold Wave — post-punk, darkwave, goth, synthpop, neo-wave · Italian Danse 1990 — new beat, italo disco, industrial danse, EBM · Near Dark — ILLUSIONS XX, Halloween 2021 · Tomb Swag — witch house, minimal wave, horrorcore, 2011

There are twenty-three mixes in the ILLUSIONS series if you want the whole arc.

6. Rave & 90s Retro

In the rave scene since ‘93 — hardcore, gabber, eurodance.

My first real “work” (fun work) in music was rave promotion. I founded PBS in 1997 with high school friends and ran parties through 2000 that deliberately mixed jungle and hardcore with noise, experimental and live acts — including Life Is But A Dream at the Millvale Industrial Theater in 1998 with Marcus Visionary, and the all-night finale And Now For Something Completely Different at Neville Ice Arena in 2000.

Alongside that I played the era’s regional raves: Magick 2, Submerged 2 (a happy hardcore set), Onetopia, Technodrome with Deadly Buda, Break of Dawn, Unraveled, Gyrophare, Bisquick 18, GRRR, Just A Party, Imbalance, Nuclear Confusion, and later Bring It Back 2, EGL3, Get Awesome 2, 3D Thriller and Electrolade with Frankie Bones and Heather Heart.

I’ve been collecting and playing this music continuously ever since rather than picking it up as a revival — which is the whole distinction. I guest periodically at 3AM Eternal, the Pittsburgh night built on 90s Eurotrash, rave and EBM, where the trash and the transcendent get equal weight.

• Sound: breakbeat hardcore and 92–95 rave · UK hardcore and happy hardcore · gabber and hardstyle · hard techno and acid · eurodance and eurotrash anthems · new beat · freestyle · ragga hardcore
• Also: Headbangers Ball with Lenny Dee (2011) · Mark N of Bloody Fist (2008) · Totally Underground and Rave Reunion throwback parties · 90s Night and 80s Night residencies at Belvederes · Trash Night and Forced Hardcore one-offs
• Worth knowing: a long history of theme nights and absurdist party concepts — foam parties, VHS parties, pudding wrestling, cereal parties, roller disco, Twin Peaks nights — for anyone who wants a hook beyond a guest booking

Listen: Piano Smasher — UK breakbeat hardcore, happy hardcore and piano jungle anthems · 10,000% Absolute F*cking Thundertroll — 90s gabber, focused on the most absurd jams · Crazy Frog’s House Party — two hours of 90s eurodance and rave pop · Rave Demon — 90 minutes of high-energy rave, jungle and hardcore

7. Open Format & Eclectic

Thirty years of records, no genre — Warhol to Brillobox.

Alongside the genre nights I’ve always worked open format and institutional rooms. Starting in the early 2000s, I really diversified and expanded the styles I played, honed my skills in many styles and took in different gigs. Lots of that was due to me reaching out to different promoters, and often working with Edgar Um on different events and shows. Shame On ran monthly at Brillobox from 2006 to 2009 with Edgar Um and guests — electro, acid, rock, funk, new wave, italo disco, no wave, whatever moved a mixed (queer, cis, whatever) crowd.

I still work that way regularly: In The Weeds vinyl curator nights at the Ace Hotel, brunch sets, four-hour Field Day lobby sessions with Keebs covering shoegaze, IDM, downtempo, trip-hop, leftfield house, disco and indie dance, plus outdoor programming like Electric Picnic and the Schenley Park summer kickoff, and whatever comes up.

• Sound: 80s synthpop and electro · 90s hip hop and dancehall · reggae, ragga and rocksteady · disco and italo · indie dance and new wave · trip-hop and downtempo · shoegaze · leftfield house and techno · classic punk and powerpop
• Museums and institutions: Andy Warhol Museum (Smashing Art, Good For Your Earholes) · Carnegie Museum Sculpture Garden (a free Carnegie International show, 2008) · Mattress Factory (Icepickk 1 and 2) · New Hazlett Theater (Grand Guignol) · Wood Street Gallery · Space Gallery · Garfield Artworks · Carnegie Free Library · Ace Hotel Pittsburgh · the gallery crawl circuit
• Benefits: Hot House / Sprout Fund · Persad Center · Bike PGH · Animal Friends · the Living Wage Campaign · Getting Out Her Vote · Flux
• Opened for bands including: Peaches, Wolf Eyes, Girl Talk, Dan Deacon, Das Racist, RJD2, OK Go, Grand Buffet, Chinese Stars, Extreme Animals, Daedelus, Anamanaguchi, Glitch Mob, Japanther, Black Moth Super Rainbow, Lil Ugly Mane, Kill Alters, Balam Acab, Brown Angel

Listen: 80disco — 80s synthpop, early-2000s electro and italo, all vinyl, 2004 · Work Your Body — roller skate, breakdance and italo boogie · Teenage Obsessions — indie-balearic-new-wave electro remixes · Sun Hits — sun-drenched IDM, dubstep, techno and post-rock

The point of all this

Seven areas, one record collection, and a lot of overlap between them — hardcore lead to jungle, into drum and bass and breakcore, college radio and the distro brought me the IDM, and the rave stuff is the reason any of it happened. Splitting it up isn’t about pretending these are separate careers. It’s about being able to answer “what do you play” in one sentence instead of forty.

Currently available for one-off bookings, with open dates. Happiest opening for a headliner or taking a guest slot on a local-focused night, but can also hold down a thematic night all night. Especially interested in well-curated events, unusual rooms, bills that mix live acts and DJs, small enthusiastic crowds, and benefits for good causes.

Where everything else lives:

• Mixes and playlists — self-hosted, no ads, no login (here’s how I built it)
• soundcloud.com/cutups — the back catalogue
• blog.cutupsmethod.com — full gig history and everything else
• cutups-setlists — the setlist archive, in Git, because of course it is
• arcane.city — the Pittsburgh event directory I run
• Bookings: geoff.maddock@gmail.com