Take a Break Fest Partners With Apple Music For 'DJ Mix Series'

Picture a DJ. Not someone at your next corporate event trying, and failing, to get you on the dance floor with Linda from HR while “Hot In Herre” is bursting into your ear drums. Definitely not your uncle Steve queueing up an encore of “Don’t Stop Believing” to a crowd of “I didn’t expect to get this drunk at a wedding” adults. We’re talking true DJs, the kind that use the acronym as more of a verb than a moniker, and the kind who go out of their way to differentiate between varying subgenres of electronic music.

One throughline connects every DJ scene. They are all uniquely fleeting moments. In the platonic ideal of a DJ dance night, you’ll hear things you know in a way you’ve never heard them, never to be heard again. The DJ industry is built to rely on this paradox, with each new mix born and killed within the confines of a dark, sweaty room of dancers.

It had to be this way since the advent of streaming, obviously, with nearly every club mix featuring either one or more copyrighted tracks being remixed.

Apple Music recently reached out to Jake Gatewood, the 24-year-old North Texan entrepreneur behind Take a Break, a traveling house music carnival that often features Gatewood behind the DJ deck.

His DJing journey has been a wild ride, to say the least. As a young teenager, he made a name for himself as a hip-hop DJ opening at small local festivals. He lived out nearly every dream scenario for a mid-2010s high school boy, culminating in multiple nationwide tours as either an opener or backing DJ with Soundcloud rap-era artists like Chief Keef, XXXTentacion and Ski Mask the Slump God.

But every rollercoaster has to stop, and this ride’s conclusion was Gatewood’s doing.

“I just felt like I’d opened for every artist that I’ve ever listened to,” he says. “I reached the height of all that the story would be when I toured. It was awesome and a blessing. I got to see the USA, perform in nearly every state, it was insane. But I felt like that’s all it would be.”

Most artists would be satisfied with half of Gatewood’s career to that point, but he decided to change course before he was even done with puberty. The touring was fun, but Gatewood sought a firm brand to lean on. In 2022, he launched “Take a Break,” a one-night house music festival hosted at Deep Ellum Art Co. that marked the brand’s first event and Gatewood’s musical pivot toward house/dance music.

“It’s a constant groove,” Gatewood says of the genre. “It’s relaxing, but you could always find your footing in it.”

The initial show was headlined by DLMT, and was successful enough to host a second night at Art Co. later that year on Sept. 17.

The next event was at Trees in April 2023, and it sold out. The subsequent one-year anniversary party of the brand did too. Weeks later, a Take a Break rooftop party at the Canvas Hotel made it a hat trick. The promotion has now hit capacity on six of its last eight shows.

Take a Break isn’t leaving the Dallas scene, yet it might be going straight to your headphones. Gatewood, via Take a Break, was asked to be an official curator for Apple Music’s DJ Mix Series, making years of unauthorized DJ mixes available on streaming and marking the first time ever that DJs could earn royalties on their mixes, with the original copyrighted artist also getting a share of the dividends too.

Gatewood curated a 10-artist roster, including himself, to release individual recorded sets on Feb. 21. It was the opportunity of a lifetime, but not without its pressures.

“I wanted to represent Texas,” Gatewood says. “Take a Break as a brand is encapsulated by house and disco music, so when I’m booking the lineups for our actual events, those are the people I listen to on a daily basis.”

Arranging a set of compilation albums proved to be a lot like booking a sold-out event. The initial release includes Dallas-based Trey Kams and Austin’s Boogie Traxx, both of whom have played sets at Take a Break.

Trey Nakhoda, who goes by Trey Kams on stage, met Gatewood in 2019 and has watched him at every stage of the process.

“I’ve watched him grow Take a Break,” says Nakhoda. “I think this new program is great, especially catering to DJs and being able to officially put out mixes.”

Brandon Keeks, who goes by Boogie Traxx, also chimed in. He started his Daft Punk-inspired project in 2017 after growing jaded as a wedding DJ.

“I think a big aspect of it is you look weird if you’re not dancing,” he says of the Take a Break events. “You’re not seeing a lot of phones out or people stopping to take pictures. I would describe his parties as like, ‘Prepare to get sweaty.’”

Keeks, Nakhoda and Gatewood himself now all have official albums released on Apple Music where listeners can prepare to get sweaty from the comfort of their home, work or commute. They’re all available to listen with an Apple Music subscription, with more releases planned under the Take a Break brand.