Joystick Junkies launches DJ partnership

British fashion label Joystick Junkies has teamed up with leading music producer / DJ's Alexander Koning and Mike Ravelli who will DJ under the name The Joystick Junkies to co-promote each other's work and develop unique dance music & gaming cross over opportunities. The pair, both self proclaimed video game addicts as well as leading music guru's approached Joystick Junkies with the idea of working together under the name early in 2007 and have since played a number of high profile shows around europe including Ministry of Sound in Moscow as The Joystick Junkies.

Alexander Koning is based in Amsterdam and regularly DJ's in Sweden, Hungary, Bosnia, Ukraine, Croatia, England and Russia. Starting off as a club organiser and then DJ, Alexander's went on to produce tracks, the first of which, 'Tiwanaku' was picked up for Global Underground, the groundbreaking series of CDs that sold millions of copies worldwide. After that he made, mixed and remixed dozens of tunes that represent his love for good house music and well produced techno tacks for labels like Subliminal, Pacha, Bellboy, Sway, Bamboo, Supreme, Madnurse, Concept and Eddie Halliwell's Mix Mag CD's.

>From his early days owning a 'Vectrex' console in the 80's to buying up old arcade machines and installing them (and his bed) in a warehouse, Alexander has been a massive gaming fan, and this led him to be one of the first in to rehab for games addiction in 1985.

Returning to gaming in 1999, he met Mike Ravell, a guy who'd been playing since he was 5, had mastered every game within days and was bored within the week. 16 hour gaming days were de rigeur for Mike, but this was balanced with the other addiction he shared with Alexander, music.

Appearing on the legendary GZG Familie weekend in the summer of 2005, Mike is known for his six-hour marathon DJ sets and is part of the Gasten Zonder Grenzen DJ collective, widely known for their wild (after) parties in Amsterdam. As a partner of underground heroes like Ille Bitch and De Man Zonder Schaduw, he has found his own space in the Dutch scene. He now has a residency for Club Stalker and GZG, international gigs and Mike also plays weekly on global radio station, www.livesets.com.

It was Christmas 2003 when Mike & Alexander finally met up, even though they had lived in the same street! Mike came over to Alexander's warehouse and they played arcade games for 15 days solid. Amazingly they survived the ordeal and that's when the idea started to make music using the old gaming machines.. They hooked the machines to their computers, the computers to the net., and bam another addiction was born - making music with old game consoles. They've now teamed up with British fashion label Joystick Junkies who saw the potential for working together with a credible, hard working DJ team to co-promote each other's work and develop some unique projects. Under the name The Joystick Junkies they DJ a fusion of uplifting house & techno blended with subtle video game influences which also inspire Joystick Junkies fashion collections.

You can see the Joystick Junkies DJ team's myspace page at http://www.myspace.com/thejoystickjunkiesdj and see their full DJ gig listing. Upcoming shows include Loveland festival (mainstage), Watergate Berlin, Exit - Croatia, Wooferland festival (closing act), Herissonisos - Crete (Greece), Madrid, Roring - Woodstock 69 - Upstruct at Patronaat with Danny Howells and Resident for Upstruct, Eye on the future, Stalker, Patronaat and The beginning.

For more information on Joystick Junkies the fashion label or DJ's contact Chris Birch on +44 207 724 9243 or email chris@joystickjunkies.com.

www.joystickjunkies.com. Built for the future. Enjoy forever!