New Jersey native... Eli, also known as DJ BAD THA PROBLEM always wanted to be in the music industry. “I remember watching a documentary about Hip Hop and the Music Industry when I was 16 years old and seeing Kanye West making a beat on the MPC, DJ Scratch doing his thing on the turntables, watching DJ Drama putting together one of his Gangsta Grillz mixtapes, and Dr. Dre working the mixing boards. Just by watching that documentary alone inspired me and I fell in love with not just music but also the production side of things. I wanted to learn how to do it all.” says DJ BAD. 

​

“My dad bought me a whole bunch of studio equipment for Christmas one year to get me started. I even went to the bookstore and bought a bunch of books to learn about the Music Business and study Audio Engineering. From that day forward I turned my bedroom into a home studio and started practicing every day when I came home from school." At the age of 18, DJ BAD received a set of CDJ’s and a mixer and started to practice and learn how to DJ. “I would watch various YouTube tutorials on how to DJ, how to put together mixes, blends, remixes etc and practice each day.

 

Once I felt like my mixes were good enough, I started making blends and uploading them to Myspace and Soundcloud. After a while the blends that I was creating started to gain a lot of traction.” says BAD. DJ BAD started receiving a lot of friend's requests on Myspace and received messages from people providing good feedback on the blends BAD was uploading.

 

BAD then started collaborating with unsigned artists that BAD had talked to on Myspace and started making mixtapes with them. 

​

''My mission was to help these unsigned artists break their records so that they can eventually be signed to a major label. '' says DJ BAD THA PROBLEM. ''I believed in them and they believed in me''. While networking and collaborating with artists. DJ BAD THA PROBLEM joined an independent label called Purple Label Ent. The CEO there was also a hip hop artist who went by the name of 45 Tha Feva. 45 Tha Feva was an unsigned artist. ''I helped promote his music and so did his DJ at the time... DJ E - DUB." says DJ BAD THA PROBLEM. 45 eventually signed to Young Jeezy's label, CTE.

​

Moving on from networking on Myspace. DJ BAD made a Twitter and started networking, promoting artists and mixtapes on there. Doing so led BAD to linking with Sean Kingston's former DJ, DJ Kelo. ''I remember talking to DJ Kelo who at the time was Sean Kingston's official DJ and telling him my dream of becoming a successful DJ one day."says DJ BAD. “I sent him a few of my mixes that day and soon after that I was officially a part of his DJ crew the Team Titan DJ’s. DJ Kelo is one of my mentors and I consider him a big brother too me because he has taught me a lot and helped me throughout my career.” says DJ BAD THA PROBLEM. 

​

Once DJ BAD joined the Team Titan DJ’s, BAD started to flood the internet with mixtapes. Doing so brought BAD a lot of opportunities, but not at first. “I felt like people weren't taking me seriously and didn’t want to work me for whatever reason.” says DJ BAD.

 

Therefore, I had to hit the ground running and outwork every DJ out there who were dropping mixtapes. So that’s what I did. I started dropping a mixtape every week for two years straight. Sometimes I would drop two mixtapes in a week or even three. I was that hungry. After a while doors started to open, opportunities came up and people started to pay attention to me.”  

​

Since then, DJ BAD has worked and collaborated on various mixtape projects with major artists and brands such as Bricksquad Ent., Short Dawg, Duck Tape Ent. and other independent artists. BAD later joined another DJ crew 24K Mixtape DJs founded by DJ Pop Dukez. 

​

DJ BAD THA PROBLEM's mixtapes has surpassed over 4.1 million streams and the numbers continue to grow.

​

Later down the road, DJ BAD started to work in radio. Hosting a radio show called “Tha Problem Hour” on Da Grind Music Radio. An internet radio station.

​

Today you can see DJ BAD still flooding the internet with mixtapes and working closely with two artists, City The Great who is signed to Hip Hop legend Special Ed and Southern Soul Artist Poka Jones. All while building the brand and record label CERTIFIED HITz Music Group. 

​

​