Nepol Records
DJ Phoenix attended his first St. Louis rave at the beginning of the 1990s — and never really left the party. Soon a fixture at events across the Midwest, he and a crew of like-minded friends began promoting under the name Mars, throwing legendary parties — “Tribes Of Unity,” “Sykodelik Peace Phreaks,” “Soopafly” — that heads still talk about. When he turned from promoting to the decks, his mentor was the iconic DJ Jajo (Juan Mauri Vera, R.I.P.), who brought him up playing alongside him at Fallout and Hyperspace — the same Jajo who gave so many St. Louis artists their start.
Performing from 1995 onward, Phoenix played rooms across the Midwest and the country — Otherworld, Fallout and Hyperspace in the 90s, parties from Interstellar Outback 2 to Cincinnati’s Aural Flux, later a residency at The Upstairs Lounge — and beyond it: in July 2005 he took the sound to La Paz, Bolivia, playing the club Forum and an underground warehouse party in the city. Back in 1995 he had joined forces with dysphonix as Collective Consciousness, pressing “Nexus/Mirage” on Silver Seven Records — a clear-vinyl 12″ that sold copies across the United States and Europe. Their remix of Bio Genesis’ “Thoughts of the Future” (NR 001) drew plays from high-profile DJs including Chris Fortier — at the Bedrock party during WMC 2002 — plus D:Fuse, Spesh, Liam Kennedy, Troy Roberts and Sean Carnahan.
In 2001 he co-founded Nepol Records with Michelle Witthaus, pressing tribal trance, tech house and house from St. Louis to the world — and his fingerprints run through the wider family too: part-ownership of Silver Seven Records — while many of his mixes live on at the St. Louis Rave Archive, which preserves the scene’s history. Promoting, spinning, producing, scouting talent — three and a half decades on, the pursuit is still never ending.