MUSIC
FRESH WES
Words: Zia Hirji
Photography: Andre Pincés
What did you do before you started DJing? Lots of stuff, rode bikes around my neighbourhood, the last job I had was teaching kids and also social work. Those are the most immediate jobs that I quit before DJing. I also worked at the zoo for a while and sold shoes. So how did the whole Hollertronix party and Philly scene start? For me it was just a party I started because no one was putting our parties on and I couldn’t get a gig anywhere. There was a rock DJ thing happening at the time and there were black clubs in Philly and I was between them and there weren’t really hipsters yet, you know?
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So there was something happening there. My girlfriend at the time was doing Eighties parties and she couldn’t mix, and I was like, “Yo, I love these kinds of records.” I was into Arthur Baker, kind of Eighties vibes Electro stuff and then I just started doing parties on my own. We rented this club out near my house and didn’t make any money for about a year and then we started making some money and touring. It went to New York and it was crazy the kind of reception we had there and that was it. That was like five years ago. What about putting out the records? We first put the mixtape out and we sold like shitloads of the mixtape.
We sold them at local shops and we sold them at Turntable Lab. Turntable Lab pressed like 5,000 and they sold them really quick and we put a bootleg out to launch the Turntable Lab release and that sold out too. That was even before mashups were coming out, and that was on vinyl too. You couldn’t download the shit. So when did you flip to doing parties and putting these records out full time? What was the breaking point? I think I just hated my job. I just quit. I was sleeping less. DJing at night and waking up at eight in the morning to go to work. Eventually I was just like fuck it, nobody appreciated me at my job so I just quit
Makeup and Hair: Andrea Tiller for TRESemme Hair Care/NOBASURA.
DIPLO
