State of the Union: Dubfire

| Print Post This | Like (0) | Comments (1)

IF YOU WERE a D.C. club-goer in the early to mid-'90s, at some point you found yourself sweating it out in the backroom bunker at State of the Union, the long-defunct venue formerly at 1357 U St. NW.

It was during a long residency there that the DJ and production duo Deep Dish — Ali "Dubfire" Shirazinia and Sharam Tayebi — solidified its rapidly growing reputation for spinning some of the best sets of progressive house music in the city — and, over time, the world.

The duo DJ'd sold-out parties at some of the biggest clubs and raves on the planet, while pulling down high-profile remix assignments for the likes of Madonna and Cher and recording two acclaimed albums of original music.

While Shirazinia and Tayebi have very different personalities and musical tastes, their partnership thrived despite their divisions. But after 15 years, Deep Dish decided to go on a temporary hiatus to concentrate on solo projects.

"Deep Dish is a shared vision, but the older you get, the more you want to push your own agenda to the forefront," said Shirazinia, 36. "And we both have our egos that we don't check at the door."

Shirazinia's first solo project is the mix CD "Dubfire: Taipei," two discs of the darker, deeper and moodier sound that he brought to the Deep Dish union. In fact, aging ravers might feel like their youth has been reclaimed because much of the mix recalls those experimental, underground State of the Union days.

"I had certain [new] songs that reminded me of those old days that I had just gotten and wanted to include," Shirazinia said.

And while he looks back fondly on the early '90s dance scene, Shirazinia also isn't above tweaking it.

On the "Taipei" track "Can You Relate?," Samuel L. Session deadpans a series of questions: "What happened to the underground? What happened to the techno? What happened to the music?"

"Doing this tour in a lot of the smaller markets has really been eye-opening. I still see glow-stick ravers — some are my age, too — who really never outgrew it all," Shirazinia joked. "Some of the places are stuck in 1992, 1993."

» Club Glow at Fur, 33 Patterson St. NW; with Cedric Gervais, Sat., 10 p.m. doors, $20; 202-271-1171. (New York Avenue)

Photos courtesy Rephlektor Inkorporated