Who ' s in Town
The NERVO NERVO a. k. a a the. k. a DJing the DJing duo who duo are who a are force a force to be reckoned to be reckoned with as with they as embark they embark on world on world domination domination with shows with shows from Ibiza from to Ibiza India to, India selling, selling out their out their venues venues in in a a heartbeat. Ranked as number 24 on DJ MAG’ s Top 100,
their energy and eclectic sounds put them on a global platform, as they serve up worldclass sets. We caught up with them recently to talk about all things music and how two women are climbing the ranks to the upper echelons of dance music society.
1. How did you guys first delve into the dance music scene? Was there a specific DJ or track that attracted you to the industry?
It took some time, we were making music ourself and we were raving on the weekends. We went to the club and we started working more and more with more DJs instead of popstars, and we were more inspired by their beats and the whole method of releasing music. We learnt how to DJ ourselves and here we are now. It is definitely not an evolution. There were also some female DJs we’ ve always looked up to, like DJ Lottie.( Man, that girl is fierce!) Some tracks that made us realized this was the industry for us was from Fedde Le Grand as well.
2. With the entire stigma around female DJ’ s in the industry, have there been any situations where you’ ve found yourself being restricted by the stigma?
We feel like it’ s always been there. If you Google‘ Female DJ’ you’ re not going to get photos of Miss K8, or any other prominent female DJs. You’ re going to get photos of girls in bikini tops and that has been around since we’ ve started. This has not helped our cause. Major male DJs such as David Guetta, Armin Van Buuren see us as credible and we are equal as artist. Its not about our sexuality or our bikini tops. We think that this is what us girls will have to fight a little bit harder for, credibility.
3. NERVO has become a popular festival mainstage mainstay, what goes behind curating the ultimate festival set?
We put a lot of work in making sure all our sets, especially when we play main stage festivals. We will always try to do something different, so every set is different. This can be quite tough in the summer where we play two different festivals in a week. So to make it different and fresh, we make new introduction, new mash up as well. We give high energy during the beginning of our set and in the middle we will try and read the crowd and see what they need.
4. Talk to us about the struggles being in the dance music scene and how you have overcome them?
The biggest struggle for us is balance. Balancing between touring with producing. We used to be in the studio 5, 6 sometimes 7 days a week, but now because our touring is going so amazingly well. It gets hectic during summer and we’ re itching to get back in the studio by end of summer. Making music has become more difficult as we’ re always on the road and also we get jetlags when it is time to be creative.
5. Talk to us about your songwriting. Do all |
your |
songs |
have |
personal |
stories |
behind |
them? |
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Well, all of it has stories behind it. We’ re talking about lyrics here. Even if some songs aren’ t directly about us, we’ ve written songs about what our friends have gone through. But most of them have a real-life scenario; it’ s some sort of a diary. It’ s very interesting to see how our music has evolved with what we’ ve feeling. It’ s not about following the trend of the time, but if you had to write the same type of music every year, we’ ll get really bored. Now, we’ re excited cause we’ ve just come off from 5 weeks of studio time. We feel like we’ ve completely changed including our sound and different structures again.
6. What are your secret talents that many of your fans don’ t know?
We’ re very good cooks. Our specialties depend on what stage we’ re going through and also what season we’ re in. If we’ re in LA, we cook quite differently when we’ re in London.
7. What are your top 3 favorite things about each other?
Liv: I like Mim’ s positivity. I like her inquisitiveness, as she likes to learn. Even if it’ s regarding in music, it’ s always about something else which she wants to learn more and also her creativity.
Mim: I like Liv’ s appetite; she’ s a great partner to eat with. She’ s great to have fun with too. She’ s great to chill with as well. So it’ s FUN, EAT & CHILL!
We’ re always spending a lot of time together; we’ re like every normal sister.
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