photo courtesy of Kelly Koehler

http://www.myspace.com/kidkameleon

We recently caught up with DJ Kid Kameleon, who’ll be spinning an eclectic mix for us at the SVR after-party—from breakcore to b-more, dubstep to dancehall, club, pop, and maybe even a little rock.

SVR: Who are your major musical influences?

Kid Kameleon: DJ Singe and MC Verb of Soundlab, DJ Spooky, DJ C, DJ Ripley.

SVR: What’s your history? How long have you been DJing?

Kid Kameleon: I’ve been into electronic music ever since I heard Axel F in the mid-80s. I picked up DJing in the late 90s. I was involved with the Soundlab collective in New York in the early ’00s, a group that was interested in boundary-pushing music and art in alternative spaces throughout New York City. For the last 2 years I’ve been involved with a crew in San Francisco called Surya Dub that does a monthly party at Club 6 focused on the wide variety of bass music.

SVR: What’s your day job?

Kid Kameleon: Representing a currently important Silicon Valley constituency: the unemployed!

SVR: What’s your connection to the tech industry?

Kid Kameleon: Work through the Electronic Frontier Foundation, plus who isn’t connected to the tech industry in SF?

SVR: Why is music education for kids important to you?

Kid Kameleon: Exploring music as a kid, either solo or in groups, is the vital spark of curiosity on which much future learning is based.

Kid Kameleon has been mixing, mashing, and maximizing bass genres for over 10 years. As a staff writer for XLR8R magazine, both his interviews and monthly column “Basic Needs” take readers to the furthest extremes electronic dance music, as do the numerous mixes he’s made for Shockout, Mashit, and dozens of other sites. As a blogger and scholar, his work ranges from measuring the social interactions of online networks to the implications of file-sharing on music business models.