Lounge and trance music her forte

By Mahes Perera

A glance at Renee Divatronic and you'd never imagine that she has been working behind a console as a professional DJ playing house, lounge music and trance to guests who seek her expertise to chill out after a day of hard work. Her sophistication qualifies her to display clothes on a fashion runway. But music has always been her attraction and in Australia she is not only an EDM DJ she's a composer as well as a singer.

Now in Sri Lanka she captures centre stage at Yumi mixing electronic music tracks. Influenced by the music of Bjork and not forgetting Madonna, Renee was trained by the pioneers in electronics in Melbourne.

She confesses that during her younger days she was active in the dance scene in warehouses on Saturday nights but as always happens the change was inevitable and the switch to playing house, lounge music and trance resulted in her moving over to compose music for films and TV in Australia. Apart from that she is a vocalist and works under the name Miss Renee and Diratronic.

Question: As a DJ and I'm sure all DJs have favourite tracks. What are your all-time favourite tracks and your current tracks. Are you breathing new life in the music and how would you describe your sound?

Answer: My all-time favourite musicians are Pink Floyd, Chantoozies, Madonna and Cyndi Lauper. My current song favourites are Margo Sol - Serenade and Sofa Surfers - Various Summertime.

Here at Yumi I play lounge music, its electronic music but it's more relaxed and laid back suited to the surroundings and the ambience. I don't miss playing music for dancing per se but some times late in the evening a group of people come in and they either stand or sit in one place and move to the rhythm which gives them a great deal of happiness and makes me happy too.

I'm glad the numbers have increased and Yumi has become popular for this kind of relaxed and laid back sounds.

Q: How do you like working at Yumi, considering the fact that you left behind a totally different scenario in Melbourne?

A: I've met so many amazing people, ambassadors all round the world. Music people with remarkable views. When I went to Yumi at the Taj before my first day, my brain clicked on what type of music should be played to attract the guests. It is not a place to play techno, rock or hip hop genres which would certainly be inappropriate.

What the place needed was chill out sophistication which would create a much desired ambience. I've made a lot of friends and I'd like to spend more time in Sri Lanka. I am the only Australian DJ working in Sri Lanka at present and I'd like to meet other DJ's and exchange views on music and music production.

Q: Do you create your own music and how would you describe on the sound of your production?

A: The music I create, I have my own record label which is Divatronic Records which is available on ITUNES internationally. I've released about 25 tracks and these tracks are played by other DJs in Australia. But my tracks have not been chartered unfortunately. But hopefully this year I'll get something happening.

I haven't really pushed it earlier. I've been focussing on music production for movies and I've just completed one that took me into four years to compose. The music was for a horror movie. The movie is being distributed all over the world. My concentration is divided. I have many different hats. I handle events - child events, dance music I put other DJs to cover these events, they play other people's music.

Q: You mentioned that you compose music for horror films. Pardon me but you don't have the appearance of a person who enjoys indulging in horror films. From where do you draw your inspiration to compose such music? It must be far removed from Michael Jackson's Thriller?

A: I love horror films. I've been watching horror films since I was a child. I think I was eight or nine years when I watched my first horror film. I love stories that are scary. Today's children are hooked on horror films. It is the same as techno dance music.

When we were in high school there were four of us who used to go to late, late parties and the other three used to go to soak in hip hop or heavy metal. This was around 1996 when I was in high school and then 10 years later I'm DJing at an event and they are with us and we go "Ha! Ha! Now you know!"

Q: I'm curious, you obviously travel a lot in this job of yours does your travelling influence the sound of your compositions.

A: Yes, Definitely. I've been to so many countries, to Egypt, Guatemala, California and other places in the States, Portugal, Spain, Thailand, Indonesia and here in Sri Lanka.

What I do is for my music I have a recording device, I walk around and sample the surrounding sounds the birds, the prayer times, the drums. The sounds that I have sampled in Sri Lanka are the prayer times, the birds here I haven't heard anywhere else. Even the Sinhala language, people speaking to each other, there is rhythm in their expressions. Having sampled the sounds, I keep other effects, introduce a drum beat and my story unfolds.

Q: Internationally speaking who is the DJ you would you like to work with in the future?

A: Kevin Yost from Chicago. I met him in Melbourne about 13 years ago. He came over to DJ and I got an opportunity to chat with him. I sent him an email last week telling him that I was here in Sri Lanka working at Yumi. I even sent him a Facebook message saying 'Do you remember me? We met 13 years ago in Melbourne. I'm here in Sri Lanka playing lounge music and I really love to get you over to Sri Lanka so that we could play music together." He replied saying he'd like so much to come to Sri Lanka.

Q: Could you cast a critical eye on today's international music industry and express your honest opinion.

A: I think the music industry at present is so different from what it used to be. Its going into a electronic, psychedelic area but on the other hand like what Paul McCarthey is doing, its going back to the Beatles and rock is going back to avant garde.

Hip hop is amazing at present. It has kangarooed with outstanding singers globally. The chart hits today are going back to the '80s with a lot of warm sounds. In fact I think it's taking information from the past and bringing it to the future.