Tall and articulate, DJ iShine is the clean-cut kid that can tuck his T-shirt into his jeans while holding the heavy hip-hop confidence of Kanye as he mixes beats.
Known as DJ iShine, Chris Summers is an Ohio University freshman from Washington, D.C., studying audio production, and he is serious about his music.
It's kind of weird
but when I was a little kid I would hear little sounds in my head and I thought 'I need to get this out on a CD out of my head ' Summers said. In 2006
my parents invested money into music production equipment for me. It was really hard to convince them
because they thought it was just a fad.
Summers proved his love of production was not just a whim when he entered OU last fall to study music production. In addition to school, he makes beats and DJs on the side.
Currently I am an electronic DJ
Summers said. The difference between that and a hip-hop DJ is that they make the beats
but they get MCs to rap on their beats. When it comes to electronic DJs
you don't need a beat for the rapper so you can put the most random sounds on there. I feel like I have more creative control that way.
Summers also has creative control over the music label that he created his senior year of high school, 1Side Music. Fellow Athens hip-hop artists, including Je'an P, are on the label, too.
I came here with a mission
not just to hang around
Summers said. I want to make music.
And make music he does. His debut instrumental electro-hop album, Suite 11, drops Tuesday. Summers will give the album away as a free download for the first 24 hours of its release.
I called it Suite 11 because a suite is a place where you are in your own area and your own zone - where a person is working to their full potential
Summer said. I made it an instrumental album because I want people to get to know me better through my sounds. I mean
