Starter For Five: Nightwave

The perfect way to open a set...

One of the most exciting aspects of club culture is how a DJ set can grapple with the unknown. From one tune to the next a good selector can continually keep you on your toes, fusing genres, breaking down barriers, and generally imposing their own rules in the process.

Starter For Five is a new series on Clash in which we ask some of our favourite DJs how they start a set, using these opening gestures to take their music in all manner of different directions.

Nightwave is up first, with the Glasgow artist's brand new ‘Psychic Tonic’ 10 inch set to land via DEXT Limited on February 8th. A superb DJ, she gives us a few insights into how she approaches the opening seconds of a set…

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My first tracks vary – really depends on who I'm following and the type of crowd, whether to bring down or raise the energy to introduce my set, I often play little ambient intros I've made myself.

Here's a few tracks that spring to mind…

Sevendeaths – 'Petrograde'

This has been a favourite intro track for years, really powerful, bass-heavy and electrifying. Very versatile for mixing in the second track as well.

Koreless – 'Sun'

Classic opener, beautiful build up of euphoria, can't go wrong with this one.

Marie Davidson – 'Work It'

I've been opening with this one a lot recently, especially if I'm mixing into the previous DJs track and want to give the crowd a quick idea of what to expect! I love Marie Davidson so much, this tune really gets me worked up and excited for the set I'm about to play.

Drexciya – 'C To The Power Of X + C To The Power Of X = MM = Unknown'

There's a few Drexciya / Stinson related tunes I love to open with but I think this one gets played the most, so full of emotion and anticipation, excites the crowd and makes it easy to follow with the next tune.

Prince – 'I Wanna Be Your Lover' (Dimitri From Paris Edit)

You can't go wrong with Prince, this is a great track to restart the energy in the room and put a smile on people's faces, it builds up really nicely and I can easily mix in jacking house and take it from there.

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‘Psychic Tonic’ will be released on February 8th.

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