photo by Marc Van der Aa

Zizek is a weekly dance party thrown in Buenos Aires, Argentina whose artists mix South American sounds in a completely new and exciting way. The club’s manager is a 31-year-old San Antonio native named Grant Dull, who has called the “Paris of South America” home since 2003.

Dull and a group of Zizek artists will be bringing their mash-up sounds to the U.S. in March, playing dates in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, New York and Austin.
They’ll be appearing at SXSW on Thursday, March 13 at the Ninety Proof Lounge.

Journalist Brian Byrnes spoke with Dull just prior to his departure for Zizek’s first international tour.

Brian Byrnes/Austin Daze: What is Zizek?

Grant Dull: Zizek is a local gathering in Buenos Aires thrown by two DJs and a promoter-turned DJ that strives to be a modern party that mixes all kinds of genres and where the number one concern is the dance floor. So from that concept we started experimenting with different sounds and DJs and bands to see what worked, and it’s been working. What we do is reinterpret traditional Latin American sounds using modern technology, and that has really been the driving force behind Zizek. We incorporate elements of reggaeton, cumbia and Spanish hip-hop, and that’s given an identity to the club on a local level because people here identify with these sounds, and it’s also given us an identity on an international level because very few people are working with these sounds. A lot of our producers are amongst the best in the world at reinterpreting these sounds. Read the rest of this entry »