House Like You Love It – Inside the New 5 Mag

Reconstructing Chicago house history through flyers and art, the DJ King of Donetsk, cover mix and profile of Damian Rausch, Will Sumsuch talks to Milton Jackson and more inside 5 Mag Issue 203, out now.

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First, our cover story: no, that’s not a New Year’s Eve party flyer for real. It’s our tribute to the classic era of Chicago house music history and the pluggers that tell the story. For our cover story this issue we talk to Mario “Liv It Up” Luna and Brandon Johnson, the collector and the publisher behind the Beyond Heaven series of books that collate and reprint this treasure trove of Chicago house history, in flyer form. It was one of the most fun stories we’ve put together in a long, long time, and if we did justice to it, we hope you’ll dig it took. Mario is character and a really dope guy to talk to, and if family didn’t intervene we probably would have talked to him all night.

Also we tell a story of hacking, Russian agents and the Ukraine War, and the cybercrime boss who just loved to DJ. Meet Vyacheslav Penchukov, alias DJ Slava Rich, alias “Tank” — the DJ King of Donetsk and one of Interpol’s most wanted men in the world.

The cover mix is back and will be staying around for awhile. This issue’s mix is from Damian Rausch. We also talk to the German DJ and producer in a 5 Mag Q&A about a passion for music and an education “building beats in the basement at my parents’ house like a nerd.”

We’ve experimented in the past with a feature series exploring how producers make music. Though readable, it was never entirely satisfying — something was missing. The “something” is named Will Sumsuch. Will has taken over the concept. With his finger on the pulse of the industry, he’s brought his wealth of experience as a music producer, DJ, label owner and one of the most rigorous behind-the-scenes hustlers of records that you’ll ever find. We rebranded it “The Mixdown” and you can read the first one in this issue’s profile of Scottish deep house producer and Freerange recording artist Milton Jackson. Amazing and highly recommended stuff.

And there is way more cool stuff here. We imagined we were trimming the contents a bit and it still wound up at 89 pages. There’s more below; members can you can download the issue here. We make nearly all of 5 Mag’s content public eventually, but our members get first crack it it; if you’re interested in becoming a 5 Mag member for $6/month or $24/year, we’d love to add you. Thanks for your support!

5 Mag Issue 203

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WHAT’S INSIDE 5 MAG #203:

🔴 The DJ and the Side Hustle From Hell. Hacking, Russian agents and the cybercrime boss that loves to DJ: the strange story of Vyacheslav Penchukov, the DJ king of Donetsk.

🔴 Beyond Heaven. Discovering the hidden history of Chicago house music with the flyer collection of Mario “Liv It Up” Luna and publisher Brandon Johnson.

🔴 Milton Jackson: The Mixdown. Will Sumsuch debuts a new feature taking a deeper dive into music making with some of his favorite producers, starting with Scottish deep house hero Milton Jackson.

🔴 Damian Rausch: The Heat. 5 Mag meets the rising German DJ and producer making luscious, beautiful tracks with an ear tuned to the dancefloor.

🔴 Cops vs. Robots. The industry takes aim at AI-assisted sampling. A brief history of the RIAA and automation as they sharpen their knives to take on AI.

🔴 The Cover Mix w/ Damian Rausch. New Sanctify mix to start 2023 with one of our favorite DJs, Damian Rausch.

🔴 Barely There. You will never find a more stylish turntable than the one you can barely see.

🔴 What’s new with Arturia’s MiniLab 3. The latest iteration of the cheap but useful MIDI keyboard controller.

🔴 Vinyl on the Go with Sound Burgers. Once a Symbol of the go-go music lover in the go-go ‘80s, the Sound Burger is back for a credit-drenched holiday season.

🔴 Music Reviews 203. Your home for longform reviews of deep house, soulful house, electro, techno, disco and underground electronic music featuring records from Aterral, Louie Vega & Karen Harding, Abacus (NDATL), Shahrokh Dini (Compost), Ricardo Miranda (Noble Square), Montego Bay (Razor-N-Tape), Jorge Caiado and Paul Cut (Inner Balance), Rhythm of Paradise (Cosmic Rhythm), Hipp-e (Gabu Music), Lukas Lyrestam (Clouded House), James Bright (Life On Earth Recordings), Crackazat, Catching Flies (Indigo Soul), More Amour (Hi Quality Records) and aus (FLAU x all my thoughts).

🔴 In Rotation 203. Music dropped in heavy rotation by DASCO (Shall Not Fade), Betty Griffin (Cultures of Soul), Lovelydaze, Hector Ram (Short Attention Records), Rawfila (Tracking the DopeGeek), 0161 Underground, Roberto Corvino, DJ Said & Cee ElAssaad (Fatsouls), Sam Alfred (Gallery Recordings), Mike Inzinger, Jack District (Real Tone Records) and NONE SOUNDS (Airfono).

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