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RA.963 Kiernan Laveaux

Publicado
Nov 17, 2024
Comprimento
02:23:13

Midwest house and techno—but make it punk.
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Every DJ has their own genesis story, typically built from familiar components: a pivotal sound, a formative scene, a defining philosophy. In Kiernan Laveaux's case, her philosophy, rooted in psychedelia and experimentation, sets her apart. The Pittsburgh artist drew early inspiration from the likes of Nine Inch Nails, Depeche Mode and New Order, before coming of age in Cleveland's acid house and queer party scenes. This is when her outside-of-the-box ethos took hold, sparking a desire to constantly push the limits of what dance music could—and should—be. Listen to any of her DJ sets and you'll know what we mean: her style is scrambled (in the best way), full of zany tricks such as scratching, creative EQing and modulation. This approach is deeply tied to the Midwest's DIY tradition. In a region often overshadowed by coastal hubs like New York and Los Angeles, artists thrive in isolation and learn to cultivate a radical, disobedient energy, as evidenced by fellow contemporaries such as Eris Drew, ADAB and Davis Galvin. As Laveaux recounted in a 2023 interview with GROOVE Magazin, "Titonton Duvante once told me that being a Midwest DJ is about being able to play music made in any part of the world and making it sound like you—like it's been a piece of your spirit the entire time." Spanning two and a half spellbinding hours, Laveaux's RA Podcast offers a window into that spirit. It's a testament to her past decade as a working artist, featuring tracks from friends and capturing important memories, while also transcending its premise to become something greater. As she notes below, RA.963 is an "alternate way to experience the rewind of life" and "music to shake your hips to and decalcify your pineal gland." (For the curious, the pineal gland helps regulate your circadian rhythm.) Long story short, this mix is a beautiful, restless and resolutely wicked journey through a one-of-a-kind imagination. How lucky we are to experience it. What have you been up to recently? Making my way through a hard year of life, made better where it can be by my loved ones, my sheydim cat stepchild, exercising and dancing when I can. Our friends DJ Etta and DJ Fabiola just played amazing, life-giving sets at a freaky tea party I was blessed to be in attendance for, with amazing sound by Liftgate. It's like when hearing music feels like drinking water and you're like, "Wow I forgot how tasty water is" except that it's music that you're dancing to. Been having fun throwing events full of gay psychedelic vibes as Sweet Abyss with my mega talented audiovisual multimedia badass partner Malzof and none other than Davis Galvin, plus an expanding realm of comrades and collaborations with our Uhaul Disco and Dyspheric family. Sweet Abyss also currently is a residency I'm super thankful to have on The Lot Radio—thank you Lot, I love you—and now a multimedia label manifested by myself and the longtime bubs CCL many years in the making. Excited to see how these things all continue to expand outwards and to help more art exist in the world. Through the Sweet Abyss label I recently put out my debut EP, Pancake of the Infinite, made in collaboration with the mega talented Johnny Zoloft under our JZKL project, with contributions from our mega talented loves MIRA MIRA and Gladstone Deluxe. One of the tracks, "Horse Girls," appears in this mix, which also features turntablised excerpts from "Conversations," a piece by Ruth Anderson, released by our friends Ergot Records and lovingly engineered by the maestro known as Ali Berger and with artwork by the inimitable Matthew Goik. The EP is great if you like fun and interesting music. I'm extremely thankful to have made it with the people I did and the musicality it's woken up in me. I also joined on as an editor of Forward / Scratch, a publication examining the relationship between music and political resistance. We're seeking a wide range of perspectives and methods for this, for anyone who'd want to pitch a piece and contribute. It feels good to put my energy towards these things collectively. Also just played some fun back-to-backs with dear loved ones ADAB, Nishkosheh and Deflector. I've been DJing my pants off in places that are fun and let me do that—thank you to anyone reading this who's danced to a set of mine this year, helped make gigs and parties happen. It's deeply felt and especially so in this mix! How and where was the mix recorded? And can you tell us the idea behind it? The mix was recorded in my house with 2 XDJ 1000s, two Technics, a Pioneer mixer and an infernal amount of chutzpah. The idea was to take a snapshot of the last ten years of my life DJing. It encapsulates the uncertainty and contrasting ominous hopefulness of the now while reflecting on what's been and what's to come, including tracks that I've been playing for years: tracks left over from TUF Til Dawn in 2018, Freerotation and Underground SF 2022; a Coil and Jeff Mills blend that was in my first DJ mix ever; a track I helped birth myself; a healthy dose of friends, and on and on; inspirations and songs that inspire my approach to the mix past present and future. Every day has been something new and horrendous to experience and that phenomena definitely came through with the ebbs and flows of the mix. Lots of lamentation, joy, anger and infinite potential. Creation and destruction, chaotic conductress mode to the beyond. An alternate way to experience this mix is as the rewind of life that plays through your mind as you're being rowed down the River Styx to the afterlife and you're remembering all these different things you're glad you felt and held onto but also things you want to be and change. Then maybe you rise back up like a phoenix and fly away. The song "Grab the Gems" by my lovely friends Mooke and Twizz was also a big inspiration—it's something I've listened to a lot in moments I need to remind myself of beautiful things in life and the innovative spirit that flows through myself and others. Often you really need to pick up all the gems of your being, pass them to others in your life and live for the present. TL;DR it's also just a lot of music to shake your hips to and decalcify your pineal gland for when the speakers are speaking. What are you looking forward to in the near future? Continuing to find new ways to survive and disrupt and create and dance and have fun. What's one social or political cause you want the world to pay more attention to? I think the interconnectedness of everything in our world is something to pay attention to. It's hard for me to be issue-based when there's so many issues at hand destroying the world as we know it: the genocidal violence and displacement in Palestine, Sudan, Haiti, Congo, Lebanon, Puerto Rico; climate change being accelerated by the deeply evil, capitalist, settler colonialist US and its weapons industry, prison system and the blight on the world that it is through the nature of its existence; Germany's blind adherence to Israel to absolve its own antisemitic guilt furthering Islamophobia that seeps into arts and culture that depend on its industry; the way Israel uses pinkwashing its supposedly progressive arts and culture to mask its existence as a genocidal colony of the West, and on and on. Echoing the echo of a lot of my peers here with how it's important to connect the dots on these things, talk about navigating hypocrisies and hard truths as artists and be involved in positive change in our immediate worlds where we can be. There's power and energy in people coming together to dance. I've felt this happen in a room of people transforming together, but it can't be the end-all-be-all of what we do. It takes a village as they say, a variety of tactics and communication with each other to destroy the fascist powers that prey upon the life of the people. As a musician, I think a lot about this quote from an interview with John Coltrane. "I think music is an instrument—it can create the initial thought patterns that can change the thinking of people." What's one club or party that had a major impact on you as an artist? OK so I do need to split this up into some eternal versus recent inspiration. In Training, Heaven Is In You and Disco Paradiso parties that we manifested in Cleveland are part of the zero point of who I am as an artist. It opened my world up to what's possible and still to be done through music bringing people together and making something out of nothing: doing poppers on the skate ramp; cinderblocks under the turntables; plugging in a DI box for a live set next to the DJ; new frontiers of bisexual lighting; crying to Mourning [A] Blkstar; turning up the MPC and amps to 11; dancing to the discotheque; the fog juice basement; house music at the punk bar; science fiction workout visuals; mesh and leather and friction and ambiguity. I could go on about this and will probably do so somewhere else, but the collision and energy release of these things stays with me to this day. Recently, I played the second year of ZAP! Outdoorz festival and it was deeply inspiring—the punk electronic campout I knew I needed, but didn't know existed quite yet. It felt like the kind of festival that we would've wanted to throw in Cleveland a decade ago, in the best way, brought to life by a DMV-focused community and lineup on the border of Virginia and West Virginia. The only festival in the world where I could go freak out and pit on the sidelines to Soul Glo and Clear Channel; dance to innovative beat conduction from so many DJs playing everything from jungle to cosmic disco to breakbeat house and back again; hop in the extended jam sesh with Model Home; and vibe with a lot of open-minded freaks just freakin' it. Go and check the lineup because I guarantee everyone on it this year brought something special to it. The only downside is I missed DJ Technics because we were playing at the same time, but I'm truly honoured to have been invited to play and have my being rejuvenated by it. It's hard to have fun sometimes, but when something is fun, it's like wow… it's fun!
Tracklist