Grace of Spades: Never Stop Shouting
Grace of Spades is unmissable: She has a shock of short, platinum hair, extremities covered in tattoos, and the confident, comfortable attitude of a native New Yorker in that takes-one-to-know-one way. Crucially, Grace is often found with a bag of big, big tunes. “At the end of the day, I’m here because I enjoy myself. I like seeing people enjoy themselves,” Grace says of DJing while sipping a beer inside the Roxy Hotel on a torrentially rainy Friday evening. “Obviously, as a Virgo, controlling the vibe in a room is really fun. But I never wanted to make that a career.”
Grace has worked hard over the years with day jobs, and now DJing is much more than a side hustle. It’s the extracurricular to end all extracurriculars: a travel activity (“I really shop [for records] when I travel”), an educational opportunity, and a way to make friends. True to form, two weeks after our interview, Grace boarded a plane to London for a slew of gigs, with the sounds of New York in tow.
Mostly known for her collection of, and ear for reggae—which includes everything from classic rocksteady and skinhead reggae, to lovers rock, rub-a-dub, and dancehall—Grace is one of the focal points in New York City’s scene. Born and raised in the Manhattan neighborhood of Tribeca, where she still lives in the apartment she grew up in, Grace’s sonic trails have taken her to each of the five boroughs and far beyond.
Over two decades, Grace of Spades has hosted numerous regular parties, two radio shows (her latest, “Watch This Sound,” has been reincarnated on the reinvigorated indie station East Village Radio), and held multiple residencies. She has also opened for legends including Ken Boothe, Sister Nancy, and Johnny Osbourne.
None of it was planned, of course. Grace started DJing in bars as a teenager and, with the support of her parents (including a major boost in the form of her dad’s record collection), she grew her already strong interest in music to a full-on obsession. Her excellent selections and ability to command space—unless the vibe is more chill, of course—gained notice. “People just kept asking me [to play] and believing in me, and that’s where I realized I had a voice,” she says.
While hopping from Tribeca dive bar to hotel lounge and, later, Chinatown haunt; like a true New Yorker, Grace knows service industry people everywhere and is steadfastly loyal to her neighborhood joints. We discussed growing up with artistic parents, her reggae journey, and why New York’s reggae community beats everywhere else’s.
Tell me a little bit about the origins of you as a DJ.
My dad’s ex-girlfriend had his record collection sitting in her storage unit. I was probably like 15, and his ex-girlfriend was saying “Get these out of my apartment.” He had nowhere to put them. My mom and my stepdad built out these shelves [in our apartment] so we could store them there. And that is how I acquired all of his records.
They were there for a year or two before I started fully appreciating what they were. I mean, from a young age, I was taught how to handle a record and I was always introduced to music. [But when] you’re a little punk kid, you’re not really “Oh, my dad’s records are gonna be my house!” ‘Round 18, I’m at this regular DJ gig of my friend’s—I’m underage and drinking. I complain that my friend has a disc man sitting on one turntable, and an iPod sitting on top of another. My friend behind the bar said, “Well, why don’t you make yourself useful and come next week with some records?” I said, “Well, fine, but I’m not gonna be one of those people who’s like, all of a sudden ‘I’m a DJ.’”
A very great way to avoid being carded at bars is walking in with boxes of records saying “I’m DJing.”
The Nitecaps - Go To The Line. “There’s a section of the shelf where you can see a block of 10 or so blue copies of my Dad’s records from the early-1980s. It’s important to me for obvious reasons, but look how cute they are!”
I heard in another interview that your dad helped you during that first gig.
I was like, “I don’t know what I’m doing.” He’s like, “Ok, plug this to that, to the ground wire, do this level, and then crossfade thing.” I feel like it was one of the best times I ever had because it was so surprising that I could figure that out, and everyone was around having a great time. I think my mom even came.
So then I had to earn my keep by doing that regularly. That was a great way again, to drink for free and just be around. All of a sudden it was every Wednesday.
What were you playing at the time? Was it stuff from your dad’s collection?
I was taking a lot of compilations out–Creation Rockers, Trojan compilations. [Compilations are] the easiest place to start when you’re just discovering music…you get a much broader experience of a certain genre or of finding a new artist.
I was trying to play a lot of reggae, because that’s what I was very much into, but I was definitely playing a lot of early rock ‘n’ roll and doo-wop, R&B. I was also playing some punk. Whatever was enjoyable and whatever the place’s vibe felt like. That’s kind of when I was like, “Oh, shit, I guess I am a DJ,” because now I’m sussing out what kind of space and vibe it is.
Various Artists - Creation Rockers, Compilations 1-6. “Series from Trojan Records with each LP starting in the mid-’60s, and ending around 1979 when the albums were released. Most compilations are curated, but these showcase an arc of styles by legends like Gregory Isaacs, Prince Far I, Sugar Minott, and other veteran artists. When I started DJing, I would occasionally let a whole side play at the end of the night. I only had volumes 1-6, but during a trip to New Orleans, I went to a radio show host’s home to shop from their private collection. First thing I saw, sticking out of a crate? Vol.1 for five bucks.”
That’s one of the most fun parts about DJing–besides finding new music and getting to watch people enjoy themselves–is using your powers of room reading and vibe creation.
And controlling the vibe, if you can. Sometimes it’s beyond your control and those are some of the best times because you just learn to get out of your head. You’re just there to hang. If you’re there for money, if you’re there for serious career stuff, then it’s not fun. That’s where I drew the line for myself—I wanted to make sure that it would remain fun for me, and not feel like a job. That being said, I can treat it like work and I do take it seriously.
Your biggest tip is to work in a record store for a dealer. Tell me a little bit about those experiences; what record store or dealer was particularly influential to your DJing and collecting?
First and foremost, and kind of mainly, Deadly Dragon. They would be great for discovering people in New York. I had already been going to their parties, I had already started shopping at the store—it was a very close walk from my house. That blew my mind that this was right there. I made friends, I was going to a couple of their nights, and I came by one day in the afternoon after losing some dumb job and made a joke like “hey, if you ever need anybody, let me know.” [Deadly Dragon owner] Jeremy [Freeman] was just like, “Can you work Wednesdays? I can’t really pay you, but I can pay you in records.”
I was 20 or 21 and on unemployment; I could pay my small bills based on that unemployment and take records on the side—a dream come true!
Then there I am with a box of old 45 Jamaican blanks. What better way to discover stuff, learn things—both about music and physically about records—than sitting on a stoop with a dirty cup of soap and a toothbrush, looking at matrix numbers, and maybe typing them into the internet once in a while, if you didn’t know what the vocalist sounded like. Sometimes I knew what it was, and I felt very proud of myself. At the time, Discogs wasn’t really much of a thing; there were a bunch of nerdy sites like Roots Natty Roots, but for a long time, there were records that I didn’t think existed.
So Deadly Dragon really set a huge stage for not only discovering music, but also discovering people in New York—discovering all these other DJs, legends, people I would meet in the store who were incredibly influential artists, other influential collectors, or just people that I’m now close family friends with. I came across so many different people in that shop. I really, really am forever grateful to Jeremy for that.
I was just talking about this with Jonny Go Figure the other day; Jeremy introduced us. I’m in the middle of DJing one of the Deadly Dragon nights and he came up and was like, “This is like my reggae son. This is like my reggae sister. You guys need to be friends.” I was playing a song and Jonny looked over and was like, “Are you gonna play XYZ song, the next song on the riddim?” And I was like, “No! I forgot it at home, I’m mad.” That’s when I realized we were friends, because he had asked me about the tune I was thinking about already. Big up Jonny, but really big up Jeremy for making all of these connections.
You also worked with Ian Clark from DKR and Record City before he moved his store to Flatbush.
I worked for Ian in his basement when he had Infinitebass.net. A lot of things were switching over to Discogs at the time; it was a lot easier to sort of understand what certain things were “worth.” So that was also another great learning experience. I had my hands on records every day that I either knew or didn’t know, and started to understand money stuff beyond what I had known from the shop.
Working in a record store, working for a record dealer, you’re getting your hands on records over and over again, every day. You’re getting things you’ve maybe heard before and now you’re putting a name or image to it, or you’re looking at a label that you recognize and you’re like, “I remember I like something else on this, let me hear it.” Sometimes, you just pick up a record because it looks cool.
Those learning experiences are something I wouldn’t trade for the world. Whatever people I know that are making tons and tons of money right now, bless them. But I really appreciate what I got to learn along the way. Granted, it costs me money every day.
Before you got into Deadly Dragon and the record world, both of your parents were artist/creative types. What did your house sound like growing up?
I currently live in the apartment I grew up in. I’ve never moved from that apartment. There was jazz, there was punk, there was reggae, there were Irish jigs, there was soul. It depended on the day, on the mood. My mom’s apartment in particular was always a big hosting place—almost a hotel at points. So there were always gatherings or always people over having dinner. I had people who lived there that always brought different music into the house.
It absolutely influenced me as a DJ. [My dad would] sit back as I grew up making my own musical decisions, and just sort of encouraged them along the way. He really didn’t want to be that dad who pushed dad music, even though dad music for him was the Ramones. He has a very wide musical taste; he loved the Spice Girls when I loved the Spice Girls.
Who was his favorite Spice Girl?
I don’t know. I’d have to ask him. I’d bet you it’s Geri.
In ’99, he took me to Madison Square Garden to see them. He’s never snobby about music. When he realized I would like certain things, he’d start to just kind of nudge it—”oh you like this little darker grungier stuff, here’s some Nirvana”. So 110 percent, 150, 200 percent that my parents were involved in my becoming a DJ.
It’s rare to meet a native New Yorker, especially one living where they grew up. Do you think that living in your house has influenced how you collect?
Yes, because I have been blessed with the space. Very rarely does that happen and I do recognize that privilege very much. Although the beams are probably sagging, and the floorboards…they’re from the late 1800s. The record shelf that was built specifically for my dad’s collection was built across from where they knew one of the big beams was.
The Clash - London Calling. “What more is there to say about one of the greatest bands of all time? The Clash is responsible for who I am. The reggae-punk pipeline is one of the most important connections people need to make to understand either genre. I came up as a little punk, I have Joe Strummer to thank for my love of reggae and life as I know it now. If you have a chance to look up Vivien Goldman’s story of playing their cover of ‘Police and Thieves’ for Bob Marley; it’s rather moving.”
In my own evolution in reggae listening, I definitely started with oldies and ‘60s stuff, things that appealed to me as a fan of soul music first and foremost. It took a lot of work for me to understand what this production was doing, why it’s good, and find my way.
Same, absolutely . I think there are things that hit you in different eras of your life. Everything kind of clicks when it clicks for you. I was talking with my dear friend Maddie Ruthless recently about how we would have cringed, and maybe even laughed, at some of our favorite lovers’ rock tunes that we hear today.
It’s all building blocks. And once you sort of understand what came before, you really appreciate what came after, even if you were maybe discovering the “after” stuff first. I obviously came through reggae in the punk rock sense; I was a little punk kid and I started hearing that overlap. I had a bunch of friends who were kind of leaning into the skinhead phase, but not really reggae-heavy. But I caught on to that in terms of understanding of subculture. I kind of worked my way from there through the decades.
Barrington Levy - Bounty Hunter. “There are some crucial albums that eventually transcend the music and become visually iconic. This Bounty Hunter LP from Barrington Levy is HEAVY in both sound and appearance and has been repurposed quite a bit—most notably by a particularly popular clothing line we won’t mention… though I may own three different colors of this shirt!”
How do you find your voice as a DJ and as a collector in a city that’s so dynamic?
I didn’t really understand if I had a voice or not; I don’t think I even considered what a voice was for me. I started naturally doing things: I booked some random shows and helped manage some things. I was working for a record label—I’m talking like 15, 16. By the time I was 18,19 and this DJ “thing” became a thing, maybe it was me trying to find a voice for myself.
I think I just naturally fell into it because I did have this voice and I just was wandering around shouting it. Whoever listened, listened. And then all of a sudden, I stopped shouting and I started playing music.
[Laughs] I never stopped shouting. I’m not kidding. I’ll shout right now.
So I think the finding of the voice didn’t even happen in those first few years of DJing. People kind of chose it for me in a way. I don’t say that negatively—people were so supportive and asked me to do so many different things. Sometimes it’d be like, “Do you really want someone who wants to play reggae music at this party? Or do you really want someone who doesn’t have all the reggae music to play at this reggae party?” But people just kept asking me and believing in me, and that’s when I realized I had a voice.
How would you describe it today?
Hah, now I’m just loud.
I think it’s just a wonderful family that we’ve cultivated and a community. I don’t feel like I need to have a voice other than what we already do with each other. We all have our voices, we all have our part. And I think that’s where everyone’s really trying to find their voice: where it’s useful, where it matters, where other people hear you but also have their own voice. Not to get sappy, but you all find a way to use the best of each other to make a wonderful little scene.
I know so many scenes within each other that worked against each other. If we could all have our own events—like four awesome events in different areas of the five boroughs in one night—we all work together and we all have our voices together. I don’t find that in other cities. I don’t find it in other countries. Not yet.
What do you think it is about this large group of people that makes our community happen?
I think it’s that you’re always struggling to survive in New York. I think a lot of people leave New York because they’re like, “I can’t do it.” For people who are just like “I’m just here, this is where I put my energy and effort into,” there is a sort of camaraderie when it comes to suffering a la New York. If you’re in it, you’re in it, and I’d like to think to win it, but nobody really winnin’! We’re all just here. We’re just in it. And we’re in it together.
Even if we all yell at each other, we’re just New Yorkers, right? We’re just loud.
It is a great benefit that, if you live in New York or its surrounds, there are a lot of Jamaican folks, a lot of Caribbean folks, a lot of people who have these direct ties to this music and deep lived experiences. And there seems to be a lot of respect for people who are interested in those stories.
We’re all a lot physically closer in proximity, than say, London or LA.
People are racist everywhere, but I think in New York, nobody has time for that bullshit. Everyone sees each other on a much more level playing field. You’re trying to be in a community that is very much about loving the people around you. I see a lot of segregation in other cities, and other countries, when it comes to music scenes, when it comes to various kinds of reggae music, alternative music.
Recently, I was in London, and I feel like they play a lot of early reggae stuff that I feel is a bit on the nose to bring there. So I wanted to bring a bit of New York there, and the people came up to me saying “Wow, that was such a breath of fresh air. I’m so glad to hear some rub-a-dub tonight.” It’s nice to hear things that people don’t play all the time. And so it brings me back to New York being a special place that I think I’ve taken a bit for granted. The more I go to other places, hopefully, the more positivity we can bring to it, but the more I go to other places, the more I realize how special New York is, even though I already never planned on leaving.
It’s not segregated, and I’ve never felt more welcomed. Again, I was 18,19 getting asked to play out at a Caribbean rec center way the fuck out and Flatbush, just ’cause they liked my vibe. I feel like you fight for that in a lot of other scenes. I went to London last year, but it was hard to book gigs all of a sudden—I’d always been able to book gigs there, and I asked my friend, “Is it ’cause I’m a woman? Is it ’cause I’m white? Is it because I’m a Yankee?” And his response is essentially, “Yes.”
When you’re thinking about getting into these spaces as a young music lover, did you have any mentors?
Jeremy and the rest of the Deadly Dragon crew. Queen Majesty, Erica—especially when she started doing her own show, “Jamaica Rock” on East Village Radio she very kindly invited me on for Women’s Month. I have to big up Agent Jay, who was one of the first people to invite me out to one of the reggae nights that were going on regularly at the time, ‘Move Your Mule’ at Otto’s Shrunken Head.
Jay was very welcoming in that sense. I didn’t think I could play a full set of reggae at the time. Turns out I could have played like eight. Years later, even as an established DJ, when I did Tony Conqueror’s radio show, “Shanty Town” over on BBOX Radio, and he said, “Hey, you should do a show.” And three and a half years later, I’m still doing it. And now here we are East Village Radio.
Those are people that you don’t realize are a mentor—they’re like your friends or family—but they just push you to do something without you realizing it. There are tons of other people I’m sure, a lot of them are bartenders or other bar staff; that’s why I will forever live in the industry one way or another.
At the end of the day, it’s all you and the people who helped you along the way. It’s yesterday Grace that somehow pushed today Grace forward. Yesterday Grace agreed to do something that maybe today Grace didn’t want to do, but she’s doing it.
Yesterday Grace, probably tomorrow Grace too, has done a lot of cool shit. You can play many sets in many different places; you’ve opened for a lot of really big people. Are there any opening sets that you are particularly proud of?
The Supernova International Ska Festival last year opening for Johnny Osbourne was great, and I’ll be joining again in 2025; I did a couple of sets and that was huge in a way for me to feel a part of the bigger thing than just a one-night show. America doesn’t get a lot of three-day festivals per day, particularly around ska. Johnny Osbourne‘s “Truths and Rights” is arguably one of the best things to come out of Studio One in its later years (around 1980) and crucial to the evolution of cutting new lyrics over older riddim tracks.
Johnny Osbourne - Truths and Rights. “I met Johnny when I was still starting as a DJ, and he immediately became a huge supporter and now good friend, coming out to some of my most embarrassingly attended bar gigs, shouting me out on the mic, and always giving me a boost of confidence.”
“I am big on keepsakes (to a fault) and will never get rid of my personalized badge from when we went to Bermuda with Johnny Osbourne.”
I really love playing with my friends. When my girl Hollie Cook was playing here last year, I ended up playing for two hours before her set; I wish I’d recorded it because I was on fire. I just had a great time doing it. I don’t think I can forget DJ Center coming up going “Grace of Spades, rinsing like a washing machine.”
Is there an avenue of reggae that you’re feeling particularly pulled towards at the moment? Or do you think that your big love is being able to go in between all these different avenues?
I think the love stays the same throughout the subgenres. The love keeps branching out further a bit. There’s so much left to discover, I hope there always will be. And I hope I have the opportunity to have access to that.
Ernest Ranglin - A Mod A Mod. “A recent purchase, once again I was drawn to the cover and was only familiar with the artist. I wasn't familiar with these songs, and was pleasantly surprised. Ernest Ranglin is an important player on so many iconic records, so I couldn’t pass up an unfamiliar set of tunes from him.”
Ranking Ann - Something Fishy Going On. “Produced by Mad Professor, this is one of those drawn-to-the-artwork albums that becomes a crucial part of your collection. I naturally love female artists and will always grab what I come across, but this album opened the doors to a whole other world of that '80s UK sound that I hadn’t yet fully explored. I still need a copy of her tune ‘Feminine Gender’ if any readers want to help me out!”
Thinking back to songs that I maybe would have found “corny” when I was younger, I’m now fully into; lots and lots of real lovers rock that stems from early soul ballads. Real sweet soul: Joy-Tones’ “This Love”—hands down, that’s the sound.
That’s where I think about my dad being like, “Hey a pop bop’s a pop bop.” And then here I am playing Icona Pop “I Love It” at my friend’s wedding and it was one of the greatest DJ moments of my life.
Tell me about the origins of Grace of Spades gone global.
I was 18,19 and I had originally planned a trip to London just because that’s what I did every year or so.
A friend of Agent Jay’s through The Slackers was visiting [New York] from England, and he was at a DJ gig of mine. I was like, “I’m going to London” and he said, “Oh, well, why don’t you bring records and play my bar’s first anniversary?” This is in Leicester, two hours north of London. But he just said, “I’ll play for half your flight and your train ticket to Leicester.” Shout out to Paul!
To me, that sounds like the greatest deal in the world. That kickstarted me bringing records to the UK. I was bringing records to the UK already, I hit up my family friends that I was already going to see saying, “Hey, I’m bringing records, do you know anybody I could DJ with?” They linked me up with a couple of friends and that sort of sparked this entire other Venn Diagram of DJ network friends—other soul and reggae nerds. And then everyone knows everybody.
Delroy Wilson - “Nobody but You Babe” / Clarence Reid - “Nobody but You Babe”. “I love soul and it’s a massive influence on so much reggae. Sometimes it happens backwards, where I’ll only discover the original after the cover. I played this Delroy Wilson version of ‘Nobody but You Babe’ for years before finding the Clarence Reid version among my dad’s 45s. I am also a sucker for records that the previous owners have drawn on.”
It’s Facebook and Instagram, I hate to say it. I go to visit my cousins in France—there are people who I’ve all of a sudden been friends with on Instagram or Facebook who live in Paris and are like, “Come DJ.”
Is that how it worked in Japan?
In Japan, I didn’t DJ, but I could have if I’d brought records. I didn’t want to bring records across four different cities in a place that I really wanted to just go and see and experience.
The welcoming “come back and DJ” energy is given out there just by going out and giving a sticker. Jeremy and JD live in Japan and they both have their connections there; you say “I used to work with or DJ with the Deadly Dragon guys,” you’re immediately taken more seriously, and you’re cool. I don’t feel like I need to tell people I’m cool, but I accidentally do sometimes.
I’d love to hear about a couple good records you got in Japan.
The biggest big girl purchase was a record that I didn’t think I would hold in my hand ever again: the blank of Freddie McKay “A Little Bit.” I’ve had a bootleg of it for a very long time; sounds like shit. Doesn’t mean the recording itself doesn’t sound like shit—it’s not a great recording, I will be you know first to admit it, but I never thought I would see one in person. And I don’t want to bid for something like that on eBay.
Big up Carib Beats in Osaka, they had a whole bin of stuff that didn’t go on the website yet which is where I got a bunch of fire. I found that [record] and was just immediately hit with that stomach pang of, I’m gonna buy this, aren’t I? [It wasn’t cheap], but like I said, I will. I won’t hold this again. And I’m a big FOMO person; I’ve let a lot of things sit that I regret to this day, whether it’s the price of it now or the fact that I’ve never seen it again.
But when you find something that you know is rare, that you had never seen before – screw it, YOLO, whatever you want to tell yourself. Mike [Crash] also came across something in that bin of stuff that wasn’t on the website, knew it was something I wanted, and pulled it out for me: The Bleechers’ “Come Into My Parlor.” It’s not an unfindable song, but when I originally wanted that song, it was too expensive for me. Now, it’s like quadruple that price.
A tune that I did find in Japan—nothing expensive or anything crazy—was Delroy Wilson’s cover of “Living In The Footsteps.” Clean blank, and someone hand-wrote “Foot.” Just “foot,” I love it and it makes me giggle every time I play it.
[I like to shop at] Coco Isle in Tokyo. They’re amazing. They should be known. Kazuki, big up yourself.
Have you come across any records when you were in London that you have really been looking for?
I find something every time I’m in London. In my usual spot, I go to, Out on the Floor. I won’t even look in the regular bins; they’ll just hand me the boxes from the back. I’ll pick out a few things that I just won’t come across here in New York. I think the favorite was the Ebony Sisters’ “Each Time,” which I played with you on the radio the other day. Aside from the fact that it’s a tune I love, it was just there, and I could buy it from a friend’s record store which is always a plus.
That record was blank and it just said “good singing” in handwriting. That always just adds to more love of the actual record.
Is there anywhere locally that you like to shop?
I really shop when I travel. Obviously, I’m going to say Record City; aside from my personal bias, they’re just going to have the best selection of things for the kind of people that we are. The care and love that goes behind collecting and pricing I think really shows—priced to move, priced for the people who are really going to love and appreciate it. By record nerds, for record nerds but not in a pretentious “I know more than you” way.
We can talk about reggae for a long time, but you also collect other things.
I like to collect things that catch my eye. I’m gonna go to a reggae bin; if they don’t have that, probably just going into soul.
Byron Lee and the Dragonaires - This Is Rock-Steady '67. “I have a lot of love for fonts and layouts, especially when multiple fonts end up working together and your eyes get drawn to every part of the layout. Sometimes being drawn to cover-art works in your favor, and you end up with some heat!”
I’ve been into ‘90s, ‘80s dance 12-inch bins too. Like, go down to Generation Records and know I could find literally any awesome punk rock record I want, but I’m gonna go to these hip-hop 12-inch bins and find some fire. They have a lot of sick dancehall too for reasonable prices.
Various Artists - Original Stalag 17, 18, And 19 / Various Artists - Deejay Explosion ina Dancehall Style. “Wilfred Limonious! What more can you say? Anything with his cover art is worth getting for that alone. These two in particular are crucial riddim LPs: Stalag and Things & Time, both produced by Winston Riley. It was this sound that opened me up to the world of mixing and juggling, understanding the art of the DJ. Jumping to the ‘80s, Riley cut his own style of the riddim with numerous artists dropping lyrics on it—two of my favorites being Junie Ranks’s ‘Big and Ready’ and Supercat’s ‘Cry Fe De Youth.’”
Generation Records has brought me a few of my favorite things: Robin S “Show Me Love” 12-inch; that was a really wonderful moment of realizing I want to play more dance music outside of reggae. I think the same day I ended up buying OutKast “Hey Ya!” which I think has “I Like The Way You Move” on the other side. And those were probably the more expensive ones I bought that day.
Another time I was at Generation again buying a bunch of dancehall 12-inch and I’m like “Can I hear that more pricey Cocksparer 45 off of the wall, ‘Running Riot.’” They’re like “What is this girl doing?”
What is a record that has a particular sentimental value to you?
The Frightnrs – Nothing More to Say came out in 2016 shortly after the singer, Dan Klein, passed away from ALS. He was able to hear the album in its final form and approve the art, but did not live to see its release.
Dan was a close friend of mine for many years, going back to his early punk band days, and left a big hole in our lives. I remember their first show, their last, and countless in-between, many of which I would also be DJing. There was a long period where I couldn’t bring myself to listen to it at all, then a time where I couldn’t hear it without breaking down – eventually, I got to the point where I had to smile and be thankful that he’s able to live on and be heard by people all over the world. This record represents not only a very specific era of my life but him as a person and spirit—it keeps him here with us.
The Frightnrs - Nothing More to Say. “This record came out in 2016 shortly after the singer, Dan Klein, passed away from ALS. Klein was a close friend for many years. This record keeps him here with us.”
Is there a record that hasn’t really left your box?
Marcia Griffiths’ “Don’t Let Me Down.” I have to force myself to take it out once in a while, particularly because it’s like a rare, fragile record. I do have a later reissue of it—even though it’s still an expensive one at this point—that was the one I originally had. I bought that when I was at Deadly Dragon and at the time, was expensive to me, but really not at this time. Now I know what that reissue goes for and it’s three times as much.
The very rare, expensive blank comes from Sonny‘s collection, who is no longer with us. Particularly the fact that it has his handwriting on the sleeve, it is a very special record. I know that it was to him and also to me, for different reasons, and it just sounds so good and it’s just so beautiful. [I didn’t see her last year at Celebrate Brooklyn]—I was literally in London playing that record like God dammit.
I think I will always play it. I’d eternally beat myself up if I played the same records all the time, but that’s the one that I’m shamelessly, like “yes, you’re gonna hear me play this until the day I die.”
Marcia Griffiths - “Don’t Let Me Down”. “This is the top reggae Beatles cover, hands down. There’s something special about old Jamaican pre-release blanks. They accumulate various record shop and soundsystem stamps and sometimes pack way more of a punch in volume. I was given this record from a friend’s collection after he passed, with his handwriting on the paper sleeve. This blank is loud and I find it aesthetically pleasing to look at, plus it keeps our friend’s records spinning—RIP Sonny Sisto!”
What things are you doing now that you would like to highlight? Because you do a lot.
I’d like to highlight restarting my radio show that I did 2014-17 “Watch This Sound”; it was on a little indie Brooklyn radio station just streaming online. And I got the opportunity to restart it with the resurgence of East Village Radio, which to me is very special. It’s a very legendary indie radio that, as a city kid, like that’s just always been around. So doing that every other Wednesday on East Village radio.com is kind of cool. It was very flattering to just be welcomed into that fold.
Doing it every other week is really cool and gives me an opportunity to think about it a little bit deeper, and just put a little bit more care into it. I think everyone is super excited to have it back in the neighborhood. I actually can’t wait for someone who doesn’t love to see it to come and complain. I’d really like that. Then I know we’ve made it.
Doing festivals has been obviously a huge highlight. Supernova Ska Festival’s 10 year anniversary was in 2024, which was really awesome. I’ve only really been a part of it in these last couple years or so. So it was something I never really saw myself doing. I just felt like it was special to be a part of something like that.
The Soundscape Festival that Dub Stuy put together this past June, I loved that. Being a part of it on multiple days—not just like coming in and playing one day—was really fun. More recently, I went to Washington DC to play on one of the sound systems that was featured at Soundscape (Grand Ancestor Sound) and got to open for Mad Professor. It reminded me how vast of a DJ network I have cultivated over the years and how I should be taking more advantage of that. Looking ahead at the year, I hope to travel more and take all those friends up on their invites to come play in their city.
In fact, I kinda helped co-produce a 45 for the Swing-a-Ling subsidiary label to Names You Can Trust. And I don’t mean produced in an audio sense—granted I had input on it—but I initially brought the demo to Eric at Names You Can Trust from some friends who reached out to me saying, “Hey, I think you’re the only person who really gets this.” It is an active band out of Israel and a singer who has established himself with some other producers in groups. It can be played whenever but it is very spooky, Halloween, graveyard organ vibes.