About Now…

Aside from Frankie Knuckles or Ron Hardy, Derrick Carter is Chicago house, its nonpareil DJ interpreter. He’s made countless mixes that back up his rep, frequently highlighted by extended two-deck blends that, back in the vinyl days, constituted real feats of derring-do. His best official CD, released by the Philadelphia label 611 Records in 2002, has some of that kind of trickery: Money Chocolate’s “Keep the Love” a cappella over Eddie & the Eggs’ “Me & My Watermelon” right at the top, or the shared track six of De Pompidou’s “Girly Souly” and the gruff-Muppet vocal of Palmer Brown & Blaze’s “More Than Gold.” But the latter—“Black” is what’s worth more than gold—embeds a deeper message in the grooves. So does the cold open, an excerpt from Cicely Tyson’s award-winning The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, climaxing with the announcement to the slaves that “Y’all as free as I am.”