Photo by Nikki Yenter
Selector Max
Selector Max
Kingston BuRiAL are a DJ crew who specialize in playing Jamaican music such as dancehall, robotic reggae, rude boy goth, Jamaican synth and more. Consisting of Selector Max, Spero Lo Menzo and UpliftBo, the trio have been throwing their unique, eclectic DJ nights in Milwaukee since 2017. They currently have a residency at Promises the fourth Saturday of every month.
We spoke to Selector Max to hear more about what he and Kingston BuRiAL do.
One day six years ago, Spero Lo Menzo approached Max about doing a hardcore dancehall night, after they had DJed together in the past playing Afro-Caribbean music for Spero’s SWEET BREEZE nights. “We wanted a night where we’d just play electronic Jamaican music,” Max explains. “I had already been itching to do something different and new, so I was 100 percent down.”
Max knew that both himself and Spero had rare records that basically nobody else in the city had; the only other person they knew of who did was UpliftBo. “We decided to add Bohdan into the mix and the three of us started Kingston BuRiAL,” Max continues. “There wasn’t anything like it in Milwaukee. I didn’t know anybody who was not only doing a dancehall night but only playing vinyl doing it, and if they are playing dancehall, they’re not playing the records we have.”
Turntables Only
Kingston BuRiAL do not play with any computers or software—only turntables. Their name comes from the fact that they play a lot of underground Jamaican music with a darker edge to it. Max elaborates, “A lot of reggae and Jamaican music isn’t happy music when you really listen to it; there’s songs that touch on death and crime and gangs and stuff like that, and that’s what we like to play. Our name also refers to sound system culture and “killing your competition” sonically and musically.”
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Many of the records in Max’s collection he bought from Farwell Music back in the day (now Bullseye Records). He and the Kingston BuRiAL crew nowadays acquire many of their records from Discogs or trading online. Because people often think of artists like Bob Marley, Peter Tosh and Jimmy Cliff when they think of reggae, Max prefers not to use that term to describe Kingston BuRiAL’s style, saying, “I love all of those artists, but that’s just not what we do.”
Describing Spero Lo Menzo, Max shares, “I’ve known him for a while and he’s another amazing Milwaukee record collector. I was really stoked that Spero wanted to start something with me and that he wanted it to be dancehall—I’m into Latin and tropical music as much as I am because of him. Any time he’s getting into new music I trust him because he’s got good taste, plus he’s had a lot of other successful DJ nights like SWEET BREEZE, City-Pop Night and The Get Down.”
He continues about UpliftBo, “I don’t know how much he DJed before Kingston BuRiAL; I know that he did a little bit here and there for special events but he never had a real regular night. The thing about Bohdan is that he’s like our secret weapon…he has a crazy record collection … if there’s anybody whose record collection I’m jealous of, it’s Bohdan. There’s records that are pretty much impossible to get, and we’ll all be sitting around waiting for certain ones to be repressed, but this guy will have those original records. When we started Kingston BuRiAL, both Spero and I knew that we had to get Bohdan on with us. It was a no-brainer. He’ll get new records all the time, but he doesn’t always tell us, and then we’ll hear him play them and it’ll blow our minds.”
Respect and Love
Kingston BuRiAL debuted at High Dive in Riverwest and their six-year anniversary is coming up in August. Their DJ night moved to Promises this past February. “Joey Turbo is really good to us,” Max said about playing there. “He’s a performer and musician himself so he understands what we’re doing. I can be a really hard person to work with because when I have a vision, I want it to come out of my head how I see it in my head, and everyone who’s worked with me before knows that (laughs). I really love Promises because they respect us and I love the staff and we make each other happy, plus it’s just a cool bar.”
What excites Max most about Kingston BuRiAL nights are the people who come and are not familiar with the music they play, which according to him is most people. “Pretty much everyone who comes is about to hear music that they’ve never heard,” he reflects. “It’s not just that they haven’t heard these songs before—they’ve never heard Jamaican music talking about dark real life shit. They’ll hear it for the first time and like it without knowing what it is, and they dance to it, and then they tell their friends about it. Then they come back, and if they buy my tapes then now they’ll know those songs when we play them which is really cool.”
Selector Max is known to make mixtapes from scratch at home which he also hand-designs covers for and sells at his shows. He’ll bring a whole briefcase of them plus he often has boomboxes, tape recorders and tape decks available for sale. Max has been making mixtapes for decades, saying, “I never want to see old art forms die so I just keep doing it. If someone wants to buy a tape but they don’t have a tape player…well, I do (laughs).”
Kingston BuRiAL have t-shirts featuring the crew’s logo available at their shows as well, also hand-drawn by Max.
In addition to playing at Promises with Kingston BuRiAL, Selector Max recently began a residency at The Mothership after owner Ricky Ramirez came to a Kingston BuRiAL night and liked what he heard. Max’s debut at Mothership was a tropical night where he played a lot of Latin, Caribbean and African music. “Ricky’s another person who gets it and understands what artists are trying to do,” he adds.
Selector Max DJs at other bars, festivals, private parties and weddings as well. He’ll be spinning at the Bremen Cafe Block Party this Saturday at 4PM.
“I want to keep doing this as much as I can and let it feed my desire to be creative, which it definitely has these last six years,” Max concludes. “I’m getting all my creative juices out there through doing this; it got me back drawing again and making tapes more regularly and let me get more technical with my mixing. Every time we do a show I see new faces, and that feels really good.”
Kingston BuRiAL’s next show is coming up at Promises (538 W. National Ave.) on Saturday, July 22 at 10 p.m. Follow them on Instagram @kingstonburial for updates.
