The Italian house juggernaut Solo has just released a new track on Great Stuff! Recordings which rivals everything else he’s put out thus far.

While recent release “Midgets Go Deep” was a straight up cut of soulful housey reminiscing, “Strawberry Swing” employs a twitching kind of distortion at the base of its groove – the house flourishes are there in the background, but most of your attention is taken up by the expanding and deflating warped percussion elements of the track. You can grab the track on the new Munich Discotech Volume 12 compilation.

Preview Strawberry Swing below, and grab a free mix that Solo put together for DJ Mag that’s crammed with the usual / unusual selection of rump shaking cuts that he’s known for.

Solo – Strawberry Swing (preview)

SOLO – DJ Mag Mix July 2011 by mrsolo

So the NGDJ draft has just begun. Our first pick is DJ Drastik with his The Frenzy mix. If you enjoy this mix as much as we do be sure to support him and get him some votes so he can reach the 200 that is need to move forward in the remix competition. There are still time to enter your Letsmix.com mixes and have a chance to get the two Pacemakers we got left.

“Welcome to The Frenzy. A journey into the musical mind of yours truly, Dj Drastik. The concept of the mix is simple…Take the best pieces of some of my favorite songs and put em together. I want to stay away from the term “mash up”, its more like a constant remix. Wether its a hip hop acapella mixed with a piano from an old rave tune, to RnB drums over a folk guitar, nothing is left untouched…It truly is a frenzy of sound, yet, it keeps its flow the entire way through…I wanted to take listeners on a trip, both high and low and hopefully incite some form of emotion. Mixtapes can be so bland and emotionless nowadays… they used to inspire me… make me think differently about djing and music in general. They’d make me angry, excited, sad…i really wanted to convey some of these feelings and really try to make something timeless, something you can always go back to…please enjoy and thank you for listening!

made using 2 Technics 1200′s, Rane TTM57, Serato Scratch Live and Acid 5.0”

Next pick in a couple of days.

DJ mix platform Letsmix.com, together with Pioneer, Beatport and DJ Mag have just launched the Next Generation DJ competition. The grand prize winner wins a luxurious pair of Pioneer CDJ-2000s and paid for flights and hotel for a showcase gig at the Miami WMC! Add in a DJ Mag cover feature, agency representation, the claim to fame and you’ll have yourself a proper career launch – or at least a rejuvenating boost for those of you who are already out there.

Part one of the competition is submitting a mix and getting a minimum of 200 votes. After the 200 votes, the quality of the vote will determine whether you make it through to the second round. We at Discobelle will offer up promotional space right here, embedding three of the most awesome NGDJ mixes we hear to reach a wider audience. In a Discobelle exclusive, the makers of our three NGDJ Picks will also receive a 60GB Pacemaker device! Head over to Letsmix.com, upload your mix for competition and send us the mix link (If you already have a mix up on Letsmix.com then you can use that for the NGDJ competition). You’ll need a minimum of 200 votes before January 31st to stay in competition, and they better be really good ones or someone else will take your slot. Get your mixes up!

Leeds producer/dj and dubstep poster boy Rusko with a new and absolutely fabolous mix for DJ Magazine that includes some of our favorite tracks of his + some other huge jams, this is that good stuff so get on the download now for your dubstep fix.

Rusko presents Bloc mix (Sharebee, zip file)

Tracklist after the jump.

01. Rusko-Mr Chips
02. Skream-Meta Lick
03. Rusko-Hiphop
04. Doctor-Raise The Temperature
05. Chase & Status-Eastern Jam
06. Kid Sister-Pro Nails (Rusko Remix)
07. The Others-Bazooka
08. Caspa-Marmite
09. Rusko-Hammertime
10. Bun vs. Ill Bill-Choppa
11. Casper-Louder VIP
12. Rusko-Woo Boost
13. Leon-Bring It On (Rusko Remix)
14. The Others-King Pin
15. Rusko-Original Cut