Today we’d like to introduce you to Jordan “deejayjd” Dunbar.
Hi Jordan, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
• grew up in football, baseball and basketball • shadowed/interned for Dunbar High Boy’s basketball as a kid around NBA Hall of Fame Coach Robert Hughes alongside his assistant staff: Coach Rambo, Coach Ivory, Coach Hickman and 2002-2003 state championship roster led by fw pillar, Jeremis Smith after being introduced to Coach Hughes by my mom Yvonice Dunbar DHS’s first stat girl • two time dallas mavericks little dribbler champion • always had passion for music while playing sports and growing up listened to my dad, mom, sister, brother, and cousins’ and friend’s taste in music • interned for tc fleming at 1310 ticket, • interned for texas football and baseball legend, Jonanthan Anderson for his office w new york life • published music stories for dallas observer • started playing music for fw college and after parties in deep ellum around 2010 while interning • got introduced to audio engineer/studio head/musician, zachary light “chanantho” stayed friends over the years djing and hanging together released a song called arcturus that received 35K likes on ig • both of us connected through our appreciation for many albums from pharoah sanders, sun ra, jimmy smith, brother jack mcduff, quasimoto/madlib, MF DOOM, j dilla, stones throw records and the great hip-hop/r&B producers before us • after chanantho and i released “arcturus,” it’s well reception, moved to nyc as roommates and began to get to see many bands + djs that not only hardly come to tx, got a more personable experience with many artists in smaller venues ex: uptown vinyl supreme in the bronx w melle mel and pete rock (footage in “like a sport” zachary light and damon music video • bobbito’s rock rubber 45’s screening q&a in brooklyn • met a nice majority of the young emerging djs and creatives in the bk/nyc scene • started a personal blog with photojournalism blog of abstract photos around nyc, party flyers and recap shots during living in the city • got invited to boiler room x halfmoon brooklyn to see donis • ended up guesting for devoye’s monthly halfmoon show • djing for picki nyc summer solstice 2019 alongside red hot records producer, dustin reid • curated a line up of djs for a felt zine screening and q&a w dev moore at harlem’s meysley’s documentary center • moved back to texas fall 2019 and chanantho moved to denver • we stayed in touch and ended up starting our online webisode series, “cool cool radio” airing our first episode off s ervay in a loft a few months later • intentionally involving the format of “dj live on camera but with our friends personally invited in the stream” in reflection chanantho and i thought of a concept to theme our jams as • eventually zooming in to the intent of why we’re hosting which would be to “raise the vibe” of the venues we play at • in deeper reflection, both of us couldn’t think of any of parties/jam we’ve been invited to that we’re like that so we started hosting as “raisethevibe,net” with intention to preserve the essence of music and it’s culture that drew us in with a holistic perspective • while hosting raisethevibe x cool radio episodes, hosted a 2 month saturday residency 2021, djed for sold out raheem daughn at music of fair park, guested at beauty bar for chris rodriguez, also started helping other djs host their events with guesting, carrying gear/cable management, djed. a hiit workout at texas lottery plaza, started residency on halfmoon brooklyn (going on year four with them in 2026) monthly 2nd thursdays at noon est • archive is on mixcloud with most previous livestream rebroadcasts • released two beat tapes w chanantho “dunlight i and dunlight ii” one of the trax got played on Joshua Byrnes balamii radio show • in between all the djing, have began apprenticing and assisting chris rodriguez and ladd biggs of b.l.a.m. (basement level audio management) around texas learning turnkey event production and mixing consoles • expanding my friends to more people behind the scenes • current residencies: weekly dj jam sundays @ gustos • p.l.u.r. (peace love unity respect) at grandmas first fridays with dj brusiey (jason from neon indian), dj ricky silk and holy mt dj alden aldrich • thursdays communitea table at hao’s hosted by “choke” arte tea co and it’s food alongside dj cool mike holy mt dj • weekly wednesday live stream on raisethevibe.net • weekly djing at the sandoitchi hq • fourth fridays at church in the cliff “p.l.u.r. dallas” • fourth saturdays @ gustos for “so socialize” • halfmoon brooklyn 2nd thursdays noon (est) til two pm
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
hasn’t been a smooth road i’ll say, “textured” although there’s many with worse circumstances so i intend to not to mine for granted with lack of work ethic to quote kobe bryant, “it’s not the road it’s the destination” also to quote steve parrish, “the situation is the boss”
growing up with a sports background the concept of being at 100% to perform is always the goal yet sometimes impractical with obligations and scheduling •
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
co-creator of entertainment solutions team “raisethevibe.net”
providing, “expert sets” of music (to quote virgin hotel) as deejayjd
proud to contribute to america’s nuanced and ubiquitous cultural expression as often as possible with transparent intent
^
Any big plans?
making raisethevibe.net a household name
learning as much as possible
biggest changes likely going up ten more reps in the gym every few months
Contact Info:
- Website: https://raisethevibe.net
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@raisethevibedotnet
- Other: https://mixcloud.com/raisethevibeccr
Image Credits
dallas contemporary museum (kyria smith x deejayjd)
eyeball dj pic – jonathan anderson *noonish podcast
zacharylight.com
sandoitchi flyer
flyer by dj curz (gustos sunday flyer)
“so socialize” flyer c/o zacharylight.com
backstage pic chris rodriguez
