05.23.23 Ryan Gipson(Left) with Nico Marie(Right) taken by Malik Fabian-Mahmud
A DJ (one of our favorites) and Yogi with over 100k subscribers on YouTube. DJing gigs all over St. Louis you're bound to have danced to one of her sets. We sat down and talked about music, and individuality while skipping rocks, and doing some yoga in this conversation with Nico Marie.
I wanted to tell you a story real quick, I forgot which Materia party it was but we got in the front and you were on some amplifiers turning up. So I see you like to party hard and that’s cool. With partying and DJing, how did you start?
Djing fell into my lap. I was driving down the street in Berkley past this community center and on the marquee they were like “We have free DJ lessons” and I just went. It was free so I said why not? I started practicing with a friend of mine and then I hooked up with these people from SLUMP Fest, an underground music festival and they gave me my first outside gig. It just kinda started from there.
What made you want to keep going?
I’m a music lover, like you said I like to party. I always joke that my parties are for me to have fun and other people just happen to be there. So I was having a lot of fun doing it and meeting people, it was kinda like finding a community to be in. My first introduction to the St. Louis creative community.
I'm not a super goal-oriented person, I'm just a hustler. I just have this St. Louis: Grind. I make sure I'm creating the work that I'm satisfied with. And I think that the opportunities come from it as long as I'm working. You never know who’s watching. So I just want to make sure I’m making myself visible so that when opportunities do come people can look to me for those things.
With Djing you kinda have a niche with the South, how did that come about?
I really love Memphis' rap-Southern rap. I don’t know where it comes from, you know a lot of people in St. Louis have Southern roots like our grandparents are from Mississippi and Alabama. So we kinda have that commonality amongst us all. Growing up I remember listening to a lot of Crunk music and Three 6 Mafia most of the time. So it just carried over, I love that Southern sound and I think it has to do with the roots.
My rule is that I always play music I like, I don't play anything that I don't like because I think that part of what makes a DJ is your taste. You know what I mean? So people kind of have to trust your taste in these spaces. And of course, there are times when I'm playing stuff people have never heard before, and might never hear again, but just to see people reacting to it or enjoying it or dancing to it feels good to me because it's like okay, at least you're open to hearing different sounds or artists you’ve never heard before.
How important is crowd response let's say you play your favorite joint, you know, and nobody's jumping around. Nobody's reacting. Would you play it again?
You know, I just kind of stick with it. Because a lot of times you don't even really know how people are reacting until they come and talk to you. You know, I mean, like, there'll be a lot of times, like, I'm at a party and like, I'm somebody who loves to dance. So if I'm enjoying myself, I'm dancing, but everybody experiences things differently. So there'll be somebody who's just sitting in the bar, they just sit there the whole time, quiet, they haven't moved out one time. And they'll come up afterward, like, “Oh, my God, I loved your set!” So you never know. I always have to make sure and reassure myself, that I know what I'm doing. Trust what you're doing. If you like it, if you enjoy it, play it. Somebody else is going to enjoy it, at least one or two other people are. And that's enough for me to keep it in rotation.
Why are you one of the best DJs?
It doesn’t have anything to do with my skills, it’s because of my music taste, and my energy. Recently I was going back to watching my old TikTok and I’m like, I’m entertaining. It’s entertainment. When I DJ I’m dancing, singing the song and I think that’s what makes me a good DJ-I’m just true to myself. Thankfully I’m in a spot in my life where I’m comfortable doing what feels natural to me no matter the space. It’s also reassuring to me that people can see me in my element and see me for who I am and still seek to hire me. Nobody can do anything you do the way that you do, that is what sets you apart.
YOGA. how do you manage to stay productive with MULTIPLE mediums?
I’m a scheduler and preparer. I’ll have specific tasks for each day. I’m going to record these videos on Tuesday, make this DJ mix on Wednesday, Thursday I don’t have to do anything, you know? Also, I intermingle that stuff with personal time. When I don’t have a lot of work to do I’m making sure that I have time to myself, whether it’s spending time with my friends, or doing activities that aren’t work-related. Making sure that I have the time because I do work really hard but I do a lot of stuff in advance.
One of my favorite techniques is batching. Creating a bunch of content at one time and then distributing it over time. It’s so useful. When I’m making the mixes that I put on Instagram, I can make five or six, or seven of those at a time and upload them once a week. So now I don’t have to worry about making mixes again for another month or two. Unless something is trending that I want to do on the fly I can do that. Utilizing all these tools that social media has made for creatives like scheduling posts. Of course, I fall off from time to time because I’m human but I eventually pick back up. And that's the great thing about having people who genuinely enjoy what you do and you as an individual, they aren't really too bothered when you've taken a break. They allow you that grace.
Nico Marie
Instagram: @djnicomarie
Interviewer: Ryan Gipson II: @ryancrashed
