Ecuadorian-Lithuanian DJ Riobamba, one of our official #PerreoNYC residents, just dropped her latest edit on Apple Music, entitled “Ragga Flow x Icy Lake.” Mastered by RBMA Paris candidate Wheez-ie, the track is more than just a take on blending chopped and screwed aesthetics with reggaeton and techno. Here, she outlines the story behind the edit:
“Earlier this year, I went through a solid six months when I didn’t feel safe going out to clubs, and had to take extra precautions when I was hired to DJ because I was being stalked and harassed. I felt like I had little control over the situation, making me realize that sometimes there are limits to what we are party organizers and DJs can do to secure safe spaces. The situation granted me a renewed context of why it’s so important to listen to other peoples’ experiences of compromised safety; it’s one thing to listen with a certain distance from stories as a third party, and another to experience it yourself.
I made this live edit while recording my Ella Quiere mixtape, which explored my feelings about the club being an inherently uncontrollable and sometimes unsafe place. I challenged myself to step in front of what was scaring me most at the time, and what I found ugliest about club culture, pulling together some of the most abrasive tracks I could find to explore that darkness; it was a small step in taking away that power I felt that environment had over me at the time, and was a move toward reclaiming those spaces for myself.
The remix takes instrumentals from Texas producers Santa Muerte (their bootleg of Dat Oven’s “Icy Lake”) and a track that I came across in some creepy areas of YouTube during my #perreonyc digging sessions, and is the first in a series where I’ll be exploring edits and blends that inspire me during my live sets, building out my own work as a DJ/producer.”
Catch Riobamba at the next Perreo NYC, featuring some very special guests. Stay tuned for our announcement!