About time!

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After a dreadful start to the New Year which saw me return home to New Zealand from Madrid after, what turned out to be, a MAJOR misunderstanding. Major. The lesson learned? Do not *hack into email accounts, especially if they do not share the same native language as you and you have to translate the content back into English. Not only is it NOT cool, but the room for error, misinterpretation and general chaos is enormous. Yikes. Karma was served.

Upon my return, I could see Dad was itching to ask me “the big question”. I could see it in his eyes when he picked me up from the airport and could sense his anticipation as he restrained himself. Bless him, he gave me three whole days before he caved and finally nonchalantly commented “So, time to get a job then”?

I replied as nonchalantly as he had asked “No, I’m good thanks Dad”.

But the pressure was on. After returning home to New Zealand, humbled and with my tail firmly between my legs, I needed to take some time out to reflect on the last seven years overseas, my old goals and dreams, evaluate how much progress I had made, what was worth still pursuing and most unnerving of all, I was seriously contemplating and staying open to letting go of the old goals and dreams, the ones that I had just spent the last three + years working so hard for, and letting new goals and dreams develop aligned to the recent change in circumstances and taking into consideration the fact that I was just shy of turning 28.

Now 28 is not 22, 24 or 26. It is still young by any standards, but for a lady, there is a biological clock silently ticking within. For anyone that does not really understand what this means, it means that a lady has on average of 400 eggs, one released with every monthly cycle, which means about 400 chances of getting pregnant in our lifetime. With every menstruation, goes another chance, and once you have used all your eggs, your basket is empty and you have basically missed your chance. Of course we can keep reproducing well into our 40’s, and even 50’s, but the older we get the higher the chances are for complications with pregnancy – the ideal age is 20’s and 30’s, and 28 is getting damn fine close to 30.

So, there was a lot of soul searching. Really I was desperate for someone, anyone, to shine a light on my path. I was genuinely confused, for the first time since A Quest for the Ultimate Lifestyle began, about what projects I should be pursuing. Did I really want to DJ? The electronic music industry is synonymous with drug taking, boozing and one-night stands. Not a bad deal in my early 20’s after having lived in Ibiza for five months, but now, four years on, I get a hangover just smelling alcohol and I have learned to respect and appreciate how precious our mind / brain is, so taking drugs is a big no-no now, but I looooovvvveee electronic music, have a flare for producing, just spent the last three + years dedicating myself to DJ’ing and traveling the world with my turntables and mixer – not a logistically easy feat for a once upon a time vagabond. So after all this time and effort, I was reluctant to let that dream fade, but I was also prepared to let it go if it did not feel like it was the right thing to do anymore, and the more I accepted the fact that I was prepared to let that dream go, the more I started associating with that option.  I was resigning myself to the fact that though I never quite “made it” as a pro-DJ (I had my share of DJ gigs overseas, and even formed a dj partnership with a super awesome lady DJ (and now best friend) but nothing spectacular because in terms of amateur DJ’ing, I was still in my nappies in comparison), the lessons I learned in the journey were invaluable and are wisdoms that will come into play for future projects, whatever they happen to be. I simply did not believe / feel that it had all been in vain.

But just as stars and planets collide to teach us lessons, they also align to reward us for staying true to our values and dreams. Just as I was considering putting my turntables up for sale so I could invest that money elsewhere, two DJ gig opportunities arose for the very same night. Ironically, I was reluctant because I was certain that my DJ dreams were over, but at the same moment, I knew it would be stupid of me to not play at them, otherwise it really would have felt like I was “giving up”. At least if I played, and it was not successful, then I could change path knowing that I gave it everything I had, but it was just obviously not meant to be.

LaSonique & Charlotte Michelle 11th

By “not successful”, I mean, that no-one would like my music. You see, my biggest concern with my DJ career was that there was always a pressure to play commercial music. I knew, that being a half decent looking, tall blonde, that if I played commercial – top of the pops, top 40, slit your wrists kind of tunes, then getting DJ gigs anywhere around the world would have been super easy.  You see, most people who live in the 9 to 5 world, who are the patrons of the clubs the DJ’s play in, have limited access to music, except what they hear on the radio and clubs, so their appreciation and understanding of quality produced music is based on the commercially produced music they hear by the multi-million dollar music labels who dominate the industry and have the big bucks to promote their artists music. Of course there is a level of talent and professionalism involved, but these big, commercial labels “water down” their music and produce to please the masses. Its basically the same as shopping at Wal-mart for all your clothes. Mass produced, intended to be a one-fit-all for everyone, cringe-worthy quality and with money as the bottom line factor – quantity over quality. Any fashionista would be embarrassed to shop at Wal-mart, and so too with electronic music. It’s the multi-million dollar commercial industry vs the boutique, underground loyalists.  The first weekend out in New Zealand, one of the top promoters in Auckland told me, without ever listening to any of my music, that I needed to play commercial if I wanted to DJ here – this is how ingrained the commercial culture is around the world. His comments only compounded my doubts about whether my music would ever be accepted, appreciated and enjoyed.

To cut a long story short – I played the two gigs and am thrilled that I did. My music went down a treat and had some wonderful feedback. Two invites to guest appearance on two different radio stations in the Auckland central business district, one of those was on Tuesday which lead to an invite to DJ at a club this weekend and another gig in March, plus plenty of referrals to boutique, underground music industry promoters to play at their parties over the coming weeks and months.

This is not my middle finger

I am delighted and relieved that I stayed true to myself and true to my music style and give everyone who ever told me that I should play commercial music the big middle finger up (see photo left).  I stood my ground, refused to play commercial, and have the beginnings of a dj career laid out in front of me to pursue and based on music that I love to hear, play and dance to. If I had succumbed to the pressure and became a commercial / wedding dj, then it would have been a j.o.b. and we all know how I feel about that, but instead, my Dj’ing remains a true passion and love. It’s still early days, but it feels good to have had this break-through after all these years of practicing, being a bedroom DJ, collecting music and learning how to produce my own music. I’ve proven to myself that I can do it, I conquered my performance anxiety / stage-fright and just need to focus on growing the dj’ing from here.

So, after 6 weeks of uncharacteristic uncertainty, I found my mojo again and my old goals and dreams are still the same goals and dreams I am focused on now – it was just a (necessary) Ultimate Lifestyle Detour in the interim. Time to start making some money.

Bring on the money, honey!

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