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Syncing club beats with heart beats

How one DJ plays with speed to shape your dance experience.

Will Bensussen is an alternative hip hop producer and DJ. You might know him by his nom de clubThe Gaslamp Killer.

After moving to Los Angeles in 2006, he helped found Low End Theory, a weekly experimental hip hop and electronic music club night.

Speed is particularly important to Bensussen. If attend one of his gigs, you might notice that the beats of his music are frequently in sync with the beat of your heart. A healthy human heart beats between 60 and 120 beats per minute, he says.

“I come in so quiet and so weird you don’t even know it’s starting yet,” he says. “I build up from 60 BPM to 100 BPM, to 120 if I’m feeling really frisky. … I sort my experience using the BPMs. I like to stop whatever party was happening before I showed up and I like to start my own.”

His new album, “The Gaslamp Killer Experience,” comes out April 28th.

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