16/12/2024
A Swell History ~
excerpts;
If you happened to be a member of the Valley's old school DJ/rave scene back in the mid-1990s, there was one place where you almost always hit up for both your music and gear: Swell Records.
First opening in 1993, it's where a stomping ground and gathering spot for a "who's who" of the biggest names in the Phoenix scene. Former Scottsdale club favorite Markus Schulz was a regular there, as were the infamous Bombshelter DJs, Pete "SuperMix" Salaz, Robbie Rob, Pablo Gomez, and dozens of others.
Swell not only sold vinyl, rave wear, and a variety of turntable gear, it also functioned as label (producing mixtapes and CDs by local artists) and put on some blockbuster dance events (including its annual Musik parties). Heck, Ramirez was even known to work the turntables himself, both at those parties or at the store.
So back in the day, Swell was the epicenter of DJ culture in the Valley, correct? Yeah. I mean there was us and then later other stores opened up, but we were there first. And, for the most part, the longest.
Based on the number of high-profile DJs that were associated with Swell, its easy to see how the store earned its reputation. Yeah. We tried. We lived it, you know. We had fun.
What were the Bombshelter crew like in those early days? Radar was this young kid when the three of them -- Z-Trip, Radar, and Emile -- started hanging out. They were playing any kind of music. And I think that was another thing that we did, we didn't just do electronic music or just hip-hop, we did everything. And Emile and Z-Trip and Radar were perfect for that because they incorporated all that. I remember giving Z-Trip a Richie Hawtin remix of The Funk Mob and then he played it at every single show. I'd hand them anything, they all had open minds. It didn't matter what it was.
You guys were an epicenter for not just music but DJ/EDM culture as well, correct? Yeah. We sold clothing and records mainly, but we also had pro audio stuff and turntables. We sold thousands of turntables, fixed thousands of turntables, you name it. Anything that had to do with DJing.
Swell largely dealt with vinyl, correct? We had CDs, for the people who didn't play records or people who made mix CDs or mix tapes. But it was predominantly vinyl. At our top, we were doing $65,000 a month in vinyl. When we closed the store, we were still doing like $11,000 a month in vinyl. We had everything: Hip-hop, techno, house, electro, breakbeat, hardcore, drum 'n' bass...everything.
Swell was also a place to find out about all the underground parties and raves. I mean, your flyer rack was legendary. Yeah. Not to be arrogant, but we were the center of our scene that we created. We wanted everybody to come there and get their flyers, get their music, and get their clothes. Hang out, talk to each other, meet new friends, find other DJs to collaborate with...everything. That was the business model.
Y'all threw some major parties back in the day. Our biggest parties were called Musik where there were four rooms of DJs. There was the main room, with the biggest underground talent, and then we had a hip-hop room and maybe a drum 'n' bass or a trance room. We always had four subcultures of the electronic music scene.
By Benjamin Leatherman
October 19, 2012
If you happened to be a member of the Valley's old school DJ/rave scene back in the mid-1990s, there was one place where you almost always hit up for both your music and gear: Swell Records. Without getting too overly hyperbolic, the music and clothing emporium owned by Russel Ramirez...
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