Some fast facts about Baltimore: it’s not only largest city in the state of Maryland, but also home to a major US seaport and its finest exports are tobacco, cotton, grain, David Hasselhoff and legendary house DJ Karizma. The ‘Beast from the East’ is kaptivating, kreative, karismatic – and MCV "kaught" up with the man himself ahead of his gig at Wonderland’s Mad Hatter Tea Party next weekend.

There’s certainly an air of mystery around the man – despite our best efforts, he never revealed his real name. We heard round the traps that his nickname is Mr Fantastic – so we asked, what’s the story there? "In Baltimore, I started a residency at a club called Sky Lounge. One night I wore a shirt that said Mr Fantastic, and one of my friends called me that as a joke - and it stuck." Fair enough.

Eager for more info on his impressive 20 year DJing and producing career, we probed him about his musical roots. "Well, I was raised by both my grandmother and my mother, so there wasn’t a lot of sports watching or anything. All I ended up doing was listening to music - all kinds like jazz, country, gospel, soul, blues and big band stuff. As you can imagine, my appreciation for music was expanded ten fold thanks to my grandmother, who would buy me records from flea markets. By the time I was 7 I could tell you artists names, record labels, producers, writers and all that because I read labels all the time. By the age of 13, I was getting into playing professionally. After doing the DJ thing for 4 more years, the natural progression for a DJ after rocking a crowd is, ‘I want to make the music people are losing it to’. So when you get to a point of making the music the crowd feels… It’s just the best feeling in the world."

A feeling he must get often, as his reputation as crowd-rocker precedes his first gig in our fair land. With a smirk, we told him we were surprised that his sets don’t come with a health warning. Laughing, he said, "I think would go like this: ‘Warning: close proximity to Karizma’s set will cause frequent head movement and outbursts of uncontrollable dancing’ – ha!" We were still totally intrigued, so asked to him to elaborate. "I like to keep the crowd on their toes. I like to be unpredictable - you never know what I’m going to play or how I’m going to play it. I play with a lot of energy, after most sets I’m usually drained because I like the crowd to walk out feeling like they REALLY enjoyed themselves."

For a taste test of what the man can do when he remixes, Karizma recommends his remixes of "Music" Marvin Gaye’s "Music", Donnie’s "You got a friend", Jill Scott’s "Golden", John Legend’s "Ordinary people" and Blaze’s "Gloria’s Muse".

To cap it off, we asked what he’s most looking forward to at Wonderland next weekend? "I’m amped about being there, getting a feel for the crowd, creating a vibe, and making people sweat!"