Tell us about the mix we're listening to?

I recorded this mix in the locked down LGA of Canterbury Bankstown. Even though it's been tough, especially in this area, I've found that I've really refound my identity, my love for the multicultural communities and how grateful I am to have grown up in this area. This mix gave me a very nice break from the stress, the pressure and the frustration that came out of what felt like a pretty unfair level of lockdown for LGAs of concern. It's easy going, it's quite light yet still quite danceable. It's also a little ode and note to our Eora dance community, it features a lot of the sounds that I love that so frequently get DJed here. Everything's going to be ok, as hard as it seems right now, and hopefully this mix brings back some energy, nostalgia and emotion to people currently missing the scene we love so dearly. And of course, I needed to throw in a little trance moment.

‍

You've been involved in the Eora music scene for many years now as a music reporter / podcaster & label head and have now [very excitingly] taken the plunge into becoming a selector yourself. Who are some of your influences in starting your dj journey and was there a moment when you realised that you just had to learn how to play?

I've always sort of known how to DJ, just as a hobby with my love of dance music. Never seriously though. To be completely honest and transparent, as the podcast, record label and event organisation began to grow, with community work and giving back as the focus, I realised I was spending a lot of money, time and energy to community work. Obviously this is great, but there was a point where I realised that I also needed to make the 'Parry Talks' brand sustainable, and DJing and *hopefully* getting the odd gig will help with that. After that though, and playing house parties, and the odd party, I really really began to look up and admire the work of people around me. It's a massive credit to all my close friends that DJ, and I wouldn't be doing it without them. Whether Deepa taking the time out of her day, coming over to my renegade CDJ set up at The Lord Gladstone Hotel, spending hours fixing my mistakes, seeing Lexy (Lex Deluxe) dominate crowds and shows with her uptempo brand of dance music, Marco Vella slamming italo at a heap of sunset locations, etc etc, all reminded me of the power of curation, tastemaking and selection.

‍

Your podcast, Parry Talks, has interviewed so many of my dj crushes, who's your biggest dj crush atm you'd be dying to interview [dream big! ;) ]

To be completely honest again, a lot of the dream interviews I wanted to do when starting the project have already been conducted. I've been soooooooo grateful for the people I've already had on the podcast. They're all the best, and I've literally made some of my closest friends after meeting people via interviews. In terms of my dream DJ interviews, I already feel I'm so close to achieving some of them. I think my next step is to really dive into the minds of the Aussie expats that are currently killing it overseas. I'm quite openly obsessed with all the incredible work done by Roza Terenzi so I think that conversations would be epic. As corny as it sounds too a lot of my dream interviews are with friends that I've made that are currently overseas. I'd do some crazy things to sit down with Fleitsy and Jordy (Mall Grab) over a beer and shoot the ship. Other big ones though on my goals list include the likes of D.Tiffany, Luca Lozano, Mr Ho and Andras.

‍

What's been helping you keep sane this lockdown?

Not a whole lot. I've been going completely insane! As cliche as it is again, I feel like making sure I get as much sunlight as possible on my bike every day has been the best thing for me. Doing 5km loops up and down the Cooks River became such a mandatory part of my day. Not just for my health, but also my engagement with music. With listening to music all day and every day over at Purple Sneakers without the live club format, I got extremely isolated and got very over music, where I wasn't listening to it in a leisurely format at all. the bike rides gave me a healthy reason to engage with new music and mixes almost the same way going out to see live music would

‍

Tell us about your favourite dancefloor moment of 2021 so far?

Despite us being restricted on dancefloors for so long there were so many incredibly epic moments. None more so than THAT very well spoken about Wax'o Paradiso set at Lovejoy's nightlifestyle. When they played TJM's 'Small Circle Of Friends' my heart set alight. I've never felt that feeling on a dancefloor before, it was so euphoric and so potent. Seeing so many friends faces light up was gorgeous. It was probably also crazier because I actually went to grab mimosa's just before that moment, so rather than being deep in the dancefloor I almost witnessed it all go down from the side, which I think made it a bit more sentimental too.

‍

You've always got a million projects you're working on simultaneously, how do you manage your time and what's been keeping you motivated during this period of downtime for our local music industry?

Time management for me is crazy! People say I'm always working, always thinking about things. I have that weird, grind or die attitude that works for me. That was so corny to say ahahahha. I get a lot of enjoyment in life getting shit done and making things happen, I get a lot of anxiety from having really cool ideas  and not executing them. I also, get paid via my day to day job to do what I love so dearly which is to curate music, which still leaves me with a lot of energy to work on things like Mercury World and Parry Talks. When I was working in a call centre, doing those other projects was so taxing because I just had no energy left after work.

In terms of my motivation to do these things in lockdown, to be completely honest, I didn't really have any. It was hard, I lost a close family member and I went through a massive lull because I completely fell out of love with the idea of pursuing something around the music world. This was obviously context driven, so I really just stopped doing what I didn't feel like, and went hard on the things I felt like doing. The more time I spent with family, talking to friends and not doing work, all of a sudden made me want to do more work? If that makes sense.  

‍

What's something people might not know about you?

I'm quite the open book aha, but I guess a unique one is that I'm probably just as much into, if not more into sport than I am music. It's probably not the most common thing sometimes, finding a massive NRL head at a rave, so I guess lots of people would assume that of me.

‍

Any other projects you're working on you want to shout out?

We have a massive announcement (and release) next week. Can't say much right now, but so excited to see it come into the world. Watch THIS SPACE for updates ;)