One chilly January afternoon, despite my having been unable to get to Memphis due to a cancelled flight, I couldn’t have been happier to be in the city. Afterall, I was spending time with a talented Jill of All Trades: model, actress, and most recently DJ, who has a penchant for Polaroid film and cassette tapes. Between her imitation of her Nigerian parents’ accents and her thoughts on leggings, Rena Anakwe, better known to the club scene as DJ Lady Lane, had me practically rolling on the floor with her humor. Her energy, drive, and optimism are what have gotten her as far as she has come today, but clearly her amazing personality is what keeps her there.
I hope you, too, can gather from this interview alone, why DJ Lady Lane was the perfect person to use for Retail DJ’s first “What’s Good?” interview. May you enjoy reading it as much as I did conducting it:
DJ Lady Lane interview part 1
1/3/2010
Retail DJ: I know that you’re on Twitter, and RetailDJ is on Twitter now, so we can be Twitter buddies! I wanted to open this interview by asking, if you could “tweet” your life, put your life in 140 characters, what would you say?
DJ Lady Lane: Before I answer that, I just want to say that I think it’s bullsh*t that you can only tweet 140 characters, but then I found this extension thing that Questlove posted, so I was like haha! I should not even use that because then it’s gonna be extensive. People would be like, “Why is she even sharing these things?”
Retail DJ: Well, you know, Kelly Bensimon from Real Housewives of New York supposedly wrote a whole book on her Blackberry, so… you could possibly tweet your life!
DJ Lady Lane: In multiple tweets or one tweet?
Retail DJ: Only one tweet.
DJ Lady Lane: Not 140 tweets, one tweet [laughs] Hmmm…Nomadic nomad. . . something that I’ve learned. By recognizing love through yourself, you can help and empower others. So through music, travel, and words, the nomadic nomad spreads the word?
Retail DJ: That might more than 140 characters, but that was good!
DJ Lady Lane: Yeah, I was close! I was close! No commas. We don’t need punctuation. [laughs]
Retail DJ: Ok, so in long form, can you tell the readers a little more about who you are? i.e. where you’re from (if that’s even possible because I know you’ve moved a lot)…can you expand your tweet?
DJ Lady Lane: I was born Chinazo Rena Anakwe, for Americans [American accent] “Chinaaaahzoh Reeena Anahkway.” I am the product of Nigerian parents – Nigerian born – of the Igbo tribe. I was actually born in Canada. My parents both met in Nigeria and got married. My dad came to Canada first and was going to school, then brought my mom to Canada. They both worked very hard, got degrees there, then moved to the U.S. They had my brother in Michigan, and my dad got a scholarship to the University of Michigan. Then we moved again. My family has moved a lot – and I am not even in the mafia or the child of diplomats! [laughs]
They traveled for schooling. My parents just wanted to give us a good quality of life and a good share of the opportunities they were seeking as well. So we moved outside of Philadelphia, PA (in Cheltenham). It was a very interesting place.
We then moved to Montgomery County, where I went to an all girls’ school. We then moved to Westchester, NY when I was in 7th grade. My mom was pregnant, so when she had my sister – who just turned 13 in December – we moved. I listened to music before, but I had to sneak a lot of things. My parents never know what anyone’s saying and would sometimes ask [Nigerian accent], “Why are you listening to the words? We are just dancing.”
Retail DJ: Love the accent.
DJ Lady Lane: Oh there will be many because I know lots of people from all over the place. It’s ridiculous! [laughs] A guy I met in California once said, “Oh you are definitely from New York, because everyone I know in New York has about 50 different accents that they go through during the course of a conversation.”
So my brother and I would listen to music together. We are only 2 years apart, which means that we often beat the crap out of each other, then we’d be friends the next day, dancing and listening to different types of music. My brother is actually a hip hop artist today, which is very interesting, at least for Nigerian kids, to be in a creative and have parents who still talk to them. It’s like that sometimes, but my parents are supportive so it’s cool.
In Philadelphia, I used to listen to Power 99, Y100 which was a rock station, and Q102. Q102 is very much like the New York version of Z100, very pop-centric, but it got so bad that I knew what song was coming up next because I listened to it that much. For Power99, I used to have to sneak a little more because of the songs…especially because LL Cool J’s “Doin’ It” had come out. So while no one knew what the hell he was saying, meaning my parents, it just sounded like sex! Honestly, it really did. So every time it would come on, we’d be in the car hoping it hadn’t. Our parents would ask, “What is this nonsense you are listening to? Turn this nonsense off! What kind of children are you, eh? What are they doing?” Awkward. Note: the word “sex” was never said to us as children til we moved to NYC, and my dad would slip STD/pregnancy prevention guides under our bedroom doors! [laughs] We didn’t want to get in trouble so I’d say, “oh um, this is the first time I’ve heard this song. I don’t know what they’re talking about!”
In my room, I had my boombox, so I’d listen to everything. Music is definitely something that’s always been with me.
Retail DJ: How did living in NYC affect your music taste, if at all?
DJ Lady Lane: I have always listened all different types of music. As a child, I didn’t like country that much, but I have found a few artists that I actually enjoy now.
When I moved to New York, that’s when Brooklyn and Biggie were like…OH SNAP! Though unfortunately, Biggie died the same day I was born, March 9th, though in a different year.
Retail DJ: aww sad!
DJ Lady Lane: Yes, very sad. The first year I move to NY, Biggie Smalls dies. Sooo…
Retail DJ: Happy birthday!
DJ Lady Lane: Exactly. It’s like Happy birthday, STFU! I got the birthday punches, not the celebration! It was sad. The whole place, all of NY, was just down. I knew who Christopher Wallace was before I moved there and everything, but not to that capacity because I was in Philadelphia when he was still alive, so it was different. I remember when Junior Mafia was on the radio, but it just wasn’t the same as being in NY. But I got that little part right before he died, but then, boom, he died right on my birthday and I was like “oh sh*t.” So every year, when my birthday comes around, it’s happy and sad at the same time.
Then I went to NYU, of course you move every year because you’re getting kicked around all of the dorms. After my freshman year, my parents moved again, this time to Bucks County, Pennsylvania. But since I was in school, I didn’t really know anybody or anything there, so when I go, it’s literally just to visit my family. So even though I don’t have an official “home” so to speak, I feel like Brooklyn is the place where I am most comfortable. I don’t feel judged. I just feel like I am at home here when I come back.
More after the jump!
Retail DJ: So where is home now?
DJ Lady Lane: Well, I recently moved to California, outside of L.A., and I will be moving to Vancouver in two weeks. The nomadic nomad continues to travel! I call myself that because even I am almost in shock at how much moving I’ve done. I’m like, “this is ridiculous!” and can say, for real, for the first time, “I am home-less.” [laughs] So I’ll settle down in a place eventually, but for right now, I’m just going with the clouds, where the wind blows me, and we’ll see where I settle when that cloudsurfing dies down.
So yeah, I guess that’s “where I’m from.” [laughs]
Retail DJ: So can you tell us a little bit more about how you got into music? Because when I met you, you were still a student at NYU, and I know that you were doing some modeling, sort of looking into acting, but I didn’t know about your interest in music. Can you talk a little bit about how that all began?
DJ Lady Lane: I have the mind of an elephant – I remember everything, though I am not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. Anyway, my aunt (my mom’s sister), was very stylish. Her inspiration was Joan Collins from the show Dynasty. She had those big sunglasses and sundresses, and stayed “pimped out,” diva-ish. So she was a person who was very into music and I remember that she used to watch MTV, so I’d watch it with her as a baby. I probably shouldn’t remember watching MTV as a baby because I was born in 1984, but I remember MTV in the 80s because I was very attentive and paid attention to small details. The song I walked to as a baby was the theme song from Beverly Hills Cop. So that’s where it all started.
Retail DJ: What about your family background? How did that affect your relationship with music?
DJ Lady Lane: Nigerians love life, so music is definitely a part of our culture in general. In Africa, I feel like music is in our soul. It’s like a rhythm that’s there. Even when you go there, you can just feel it.
My dad would talk about Jimmy Cliff and my mom talked about Fela [Kuti]. My parents were raised Catholic and are very religious, but at the same time, my maternal grandfather believed that music is there for kids to dance to. So when they were younger, they would go over to friends’ houses just to dance. They’d put on music and have their own little dance parties. So music has always been there, all throughout my life.
My brother was a “dj” at 11 years old, so he got his little turntables and the system, which I did the research on and picked out (I am a bit of a tech nerd). It was the Numark Starter Kit – two turntables, comes with a mixer, cartridges, everything. This was about 13 years ago when we first came to New York (oh my gosh, I feel old). My parents were like, “Go sit down. You don’t have jobs!” so they only got him a couple records.
But I remember when MTV was about music, and I used to watch these specials on how to do things. I remember when they had an episode with DJ Skribble showing people how to mix, fade, SCRATCH! From then on, when my brother wasn’t home, I’d run upstairs and practice on his turntables. I am not sure why we thought these were records we should buy, but I remember one of them was a Cam’Ron song from the Woo soundtrack.
Retail DJ: do you remember what song it was?
DJ Lady Lane: Yes, “Pull It.” And I remember it being a bit obscure/hard to find. But we really liked the song, even though I remember nothing from Woo, the movie (sorry, Jada!).
We had Cam’Ron’s album too, and a few others, but those are the ones I remember messing around with the most.
There’s a Nigerian Association in the Hudson Valley, and they would have parties, but they would suck all the time. So we were like, “Can we do a party, and maybe have a holiday party just for the kids?” so my brother volunteered to DJ it, only to turn around and ask me if I could help him So this is where I started doing playlists because I would always make mixtapes off the radio from cassettes, even when I was little. I was a perfectionist and wanted to the tapes to be flawless, so I would re-record things to cut out commercials and announcements. I was very serious about where one song ended and the other began. I didn’t want any gaps or anything. I recently found a tape player at my aunt and uncle’s house, so I am going to jack that and start making little mixtapes again that way. You know, they still actually sell cassette tapes, which is awesome, unlike Polaroids!!
Anyway, going back to the dj gigs with my brother. I made cds for my brother, and he ended up just playing the cds I made. If there is one thing I pride myself on, it’s song order, though it was hard because our parents wouldn’t let us touch the good stuff, aka the Hidden Vinyl in their Bedroom Closet (i.e. the Pointer Sisters, Michael Jackson, etc). In the end, though, it worked out. My brother would just pop in one cd after the other.
It’s funny because that’s one of the things I started doing regularly when I was at NYU- making mix cds. During my first week as a freshman, I burned a lot of cds for people because their laptops hadn’t come in yet, so I’d let them download music on my desktop It got to the point that I even got a warning from ITS that I was downloading a lot and I’d better not be committing copyright infringement! [laughs]. I’d make cds for going to the gym, even though that didn’t work out too well because I still gained the freshman 15000 pounds. My mother was like, “Are you eating on the treadmill?” and I would say, “No, I ate before I went, then I got on and then I ate again. I’d think, “Talk to me again like that and see if I come home!”
Anyway…they were mean to me! [laughs]
Retail DJ: So when did you start doing full-on serious DJing?
DJ Lady Lane: Actual playing out, I just started this past summer. I had a friend, whom I think I met for a reason, destiny, fate, the ways of the universe, whatever, and I remember this summer, sitting there with him, watching Slumdog Millionaire win all these awards. Here we have a case of all these people who had come together from many countries to perform and celebrate this movie and this culture that is so rich. I watched all of that on the stage and I thought, “Oh my gosh, I think I met my friend because we are supposed to educate people through music,” because that’s one thing we both really connected on. I feel like any person I meet, if I can connect with you on music, then I can be your friend. And if we have disputes, it’s like, whatever, but I know that that’s a person I can have a deeper connection with because we both understand a similar language.
So the next day, I called him to come over and told him, “Ok, we are going to feed people with music! We will spread the word of music and be able to build a base in different countries, then get food for the people in the countries who need it! So we need to start being DJs now!” When I get an idea, I zoom forward really fast. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the money for vinyl, so I started looking into all my options.
Retail DJ: What were some of the methods you researched?
DJ Lady Lane: Digital controllerism. I looked into that and thought, “hmmm that’s interesting, and something I might be able to afford.” I had just graduated from college and was in a masters program, and didn’t have a disposable income. I even asked my parents to invest in me, telling them that this is something I really really want to do. This is how I put it to them, because my parents think in dollars and cents, aka pay for your own sh*t. So, I told them, “This is how I am going to eat. This is how I am going to be able to pay for stuff and then still be able to act and pursue other interests.” I’ve been in different “musical situations” like bands, which can be a little tricky.
Retail DJ: Why is that?
DJ Lady Lane: Well, I love all my former bandmates [from Violent Sex], but sometimes chaos can just be a beautiful mess. It was all these musical geniuses together, but then I became the den mother. I remember sitting in the Knitting Factory on the day of my graduation trying to organize things. They are doing beautiful things now, and have lots of involvement in spin-off groups (like Megabone). I felt like it was something that was great for the time being because I met incredible people and I learned a lot of things about the New York City music scene, but that was just not going to be my way to do it. I tried to start an all-girl band Don’t Judge Judy, but that did work out because no girls wanted to play lead guitar! I even started learning lead guitar because I thought to myself, “If I could play the guitar, I’d be ripping and shredding the sh*t out of this joint!” I even bought a Rich Bich guitar. It’s awesome! I love it. I could play chords! [laughs] I just thought this would be great, but you know, heads started butting, there was PMS, etc.
Retail DJ: So what ended up creating this shift?
DJ Lady Lane: I thought, “This is not my way of communicating through music.” I realized that I had partied my ass off to the point that I think I am an old person now, so now I enjoy going to a party with good music, which is very rare and has been very rare for a while in New York. I don’t know what the f*ck happened, but it’s so disappointing! When I was at NYU, 2002 was the cusp. The next semester, in 2003, Bloomberg came, and everything changed. I was there at the end of Giuliani’s term, so I was just running around the city. I ended up physically, spiritually, and emotionally tired because I had run around New York so much because I was just partying the whole time. I didn’t even use the Rent tickets they were giving our for free all the time. I never saw the play Rent because I was like “NEW YORK CITY. Gotta suck it all up! OMG!” not knowing it was going to change. We used to go to Village Ma, Opaline, Speed, other total holes in the wall, Level V.
Retail DJ: And remember the Roxy closed! All the really good stuff pretty much disappeared.
DJ Lady Lane: Yes! NYU shut down the Palladium [author’s note: Palladium was an infamous club from the 1980s that was shut down in order to build and NYU dorm and gym facility in its place]. Then there was the Tunnel (too many stabbings there, so they had to shut it down).
But that second semester at NYU, I actually got cast in a piece by Jaquita Shashu-Aziza Ta’le, who is one half of Nola Darling, and Alex Lavelanet for the –Ism Gala called “True Confessions of a Wanna-(B) Girl.” For that, they also castBig Tara, one of the last really well known black b-girls, to participate as well. Through that project, I was introduced to b-boys/b-girls/breaking crews. We took a pop and lock class with Pop Master Fabel. I even got to meet DJ Kool Herc! It was another part of New York that I got to experience. I just got to meet a lot of really cool people on the other side of New York that was getting shut down. I’d go to APT, and dance all over the place (just happy I got in, being that I was underage). And it’s weird now, looking at New York, know what it was and what it could be, and seeing what it’s become.
As a DJ, you really have to differentiate between your personal likes and everybody else’s because you’re playing music for a collective group, and mob mentality is strong. So you just need 1 sour apple to just say “I don’t like that,” to spread that nasty energy. You have to think about what will make people go, “OH! That’s my song!” You have to make the crowd comfortable, so if and when you want to mix in something different, outside of the norm, you can. You’ve got to get their trust first, and if you don’t, and you end up playing things they hate, you will just feel bad. So in short, just wanting to hear good music again is what really motivated me.
Retail DJ: So what are some of the programs you use when you DJ?
Dj Lady Lane: I was looking at Traktor and Serato, and for some reason, Traktor just spoke to me in terms of it being more user-friendly. It just looked like something I could learn. I’m better at self-teaching than tutoring, so it’s something I kept in mind when looking into programs. I also found a company called DJ Tech Tools, which was started by Ean Golden, one of the first people to really bring out digital controllerism as something to be recognized as a craft. It’s not someone hooking up their iPod! The biggest challenge for me these days is people not wanting to accept that.
Retail DJ: What type of opposition have you felt to digital DJing?
DJ Lady Lane: Well, California has actually been difficult because they are so set on turntablism, and the “true craft” of it. I have had people tell me that digital controllerism is simply not “real DJ-ing.” But being practical, I can’t carry around a big crate of stuff, and even now, DJs who are turntablists tend not to carry around crates because everything is digitally integrated. For me, I think it’s a big misunderstanding that digital controllerism takes just as much practice, even more so at times, because of the fact that it’s new technology. It’s not something that is well established enough that everyone knows how to use it. You really have to troubleshoot on your own and figure out what works best for you to make things work. There’s been a huge surge in electronica, and people don’t find that this type of music, being that there is no real instrument in your hand, takes the same amount of technique or craftsmanship, but that’s not true. It’s just a different way to utilize sound and create music. It speaks to people in a different way.
Retail DJ: It’s interesting that you brought that up because I recently posted an article on Retail DJ from W Magazine about “dilettante DJs.’ And while I like the article, I think they conflate the idea of celebrity and digital DJing. So they make it seem like if you’re a digital DJ or a celebrity, or both, neither require talent and that it’s just a last name. Can you expound on that a little bit? What has been the way that you’ve gotten your foot in the door being that you don’t work with vinyl?
DJ Lady Lane: The thing that helped me the most was talking to working DJs. I had a friend, DJ Mixx, who also went to NYU, who is strictly foundations, in this case meaning reggae roots, hip hop roots, vinyl, the whole nine, and he has been doing this for a while. He was actually, like, the last person I told I wanted to DJ because I was so scared that he would be like, “oh whatever.” I called him (he is actually no longer in the city and is in law school now), and told him that I was going to start DJing, but that I would be using a digital controller because I don’t have the money to buy vinyl, this is what my price range is right now, etc., and that I just want to learn how to do this. And he was like, “That’s cool. Whatever gets the music out there is the most important part. Half the time, people don’t even know what you’re using. As long as the music is what you’re focusing on, that’s all that matters. Who cares what people think?” So after that, I felt fine.
I didn’t know how to start because I was practicing in my room. The first party I did was this huge houseparty n New Jersey for a family friend who was celebrating their children’s acceptances into medical school. It was actually insane. There were two parties going on at once: one for the adults and one for the “kids,” aka “The Kegger of the Year.” I had just been practicing in my room, and all of this took place before I really knew how to connect all my stuff together and before I brought my own sound system so I could actually be a mobile digital DJ, though even that has its connotations. So from there, I had to keep seeking things out.
Retail DJ: Did you eventually figure out all the technical stuff?
DJ Lady Lane: Yeah. DJ Tech Tools is honestly the thing that’s helped me the most. They have a beautiful website and they are in constant contact with you. And their customer support is in San Francisco, so at least it’s in the same country, which makes things easier. They were so nice when I was just trying to figure out what to do, even after I had researched things to the point that it was just ridiculous. With that and the tutorials, I thought, “OK, I can do this,” but then the real question was how would I get gigs?
When I was in Don’t Judge Judy, we needed gigs. So I would just start calling places. So I did the same thing here. I made a list of places in New York that I wanted to play at and I did a lot of research on where other DJs were playing and places that played similar music to what I was doing where I wanted to spin. But I have a wide range. People would ask me “What do you spin?” and I’d reply. “I spin everything.” But you have to remember the place where you will play, and you have to cater your answer to their needs accordingly, like “for this night, I’d like to spin this,” or “I have a demo” or something you can give them. And I thought, “OK, so people keep asking me for demos. What am I going to do with this? I have to make a mixtape.” So I made this long mix, so long that my system almost crashed. The quality was so poor! It was just in the beginning. It was called “Mama’s Mix,’ but has since been deleted. [laughs] It’s all crunchy when the bass hits. I was doing the whole thing through headphones—no monitor, no speakers, nothing. I was like, “Yeah, this is bumpin’!” Then I listened to it, and was like, “What the freak is that?!?!”
. . . to be continued…
- Retail DJ
*photo courtesy of Brett Williams Photography © Rena Anakwe/DJ Lady Lane
Tags: dj lady lane, what's good?
Oh NYC. Maybe I missed my calling as a DJ. Very interesting story!