DJ and jazz artist Rebecca Vasmant on 10 things that changed her life

The National

2 days ago

1. The Stan Tracey Quartet
GOING from collecting house and techno into jazz from the day that I heard a track called The Stan Tracey Quartet - Starless and Bible Black.
From the day that I first heard that song until the rest of my life, it's completely changed the trajectory of it, and I've gone into embracing this passion for jazz, and it's changed my career, it's changed my life, it's changed my mental health.
Because listening to down-tempo jazz really helps my mindset, it's changed everything.
2. Horses
I DECIDED that I was going to try and do some things that I did in my childhood that I stopped doing in my childhood, and kind of rediscover my childhood self.
One of those things was getting back into being around horses.
It has made me really calm and centered, and happy.
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It's allowed me to feel really free and like riding around the countryside on the back of horses, and kind of work in unison with this massive being that could, at any point, just kill you, but they don't, because you form this amazing relationship with them.
I think it really symbolises how I like to be as a person in the world. Showing people mutual respect and just being grateful for other people and nature.
3. Ibiza
WHEN I was in my early twenties, I went and did my first ever DJ season in Ibiza.
It changed my life massively because, number one, it taught me how to DJ to crowds, and it also made me see that I really knew what I wanted to do with my life, even at an early age.
Doing those seasons in Ibiza, DJing, doing residencies and gaining independence, living in another culture.
I made sure that I had Spanish friends and didn't just surround myself with British people.
4. Ministry of Sound
GETTING my World Tours residency at Ministry of Sound just after Ibiza, I must have still been 22.
I got a residency where, pretty much overnight, I was flying all over the world and doing this residency for the brand.
I just went from being quite a nervous young person who was quite scared to go places on their own, into getting on planes to do multi-city tours of India, and I went all over the world.
I think that changed my perception of myself in the sense that I was a strong, independent person, and I could just do things on my own.
5. Own Place
PROBABLY getting my own place and not flat sharing because, in my late 30s, up until that point, I'd always been met with limitations of sharing your space and not being able to make noise.
I think for the first time ever, I was able to be creatively free and living on my own.
6. Paris
I WENT to DJ in Paris one night, and I met my core group of lifelong friends that I have in Paris to this day.
I just feel like you sometimes get these nights where you don't realise at the time that you're going to look back on as it changed everything, but that night really did change everything.
My dad lives in Paris because I'm half French, so I'm in Paris quite a lot and that [night] gave me a group of friends, a music network, multiple DJ residences, and a family in Paris that I never had before.
7. MacBook Pro
I WENT from not having the means or the access to be able to make music at home, because the laptop that I was on before wouldn't run Ableton.
Upgrading my laptop to a laptop, that was a second-hand one, which was good enough to run Ableton, changed my life because I then went on to teach myself how to make music.
While it is a material thing, it allowed me to open so many doors for myself, and I had saved up all my twenties, and I didn't get my first MacBook Pro until I was like 31 or something.
8. Cheese Fondue
THE first time I went to DJ in Switzerland at a ski festival, I tried my first cheese fondue, and oh my God, I'm now absolutely obsessed with any form of melted cheese.
Sometimes food is not really that life-changing, or it's not really that deep, but cheese fondue is absolutely that deep to me.
The way I cook, the way I think about food now, is just so different because of using wine in the sauce and just all these things to do with the actual food itself feels a bit spiritual when you cook in the kitchen.
It made cooking exciting for me.
9. Mr Scruff
THE moment that Andy, AKA Mr Scruff, asked us to play my music live.
We formed the band that we now play in, and then we basically went on to do four plus years of touring and playing all over with a nine-piece jazz band, which is absolutely mental.
That one phone call where he asked us to play live has definitely changed my life.
10. The Internet
THE first time that we had a computer at home and we had the internet on the computer.
I started to realise that there was a bigger world out there other than just the small village that I live in [Saline].
Even the concept of the internet existing and being able to speak to people in other countries and being able to send an email, because I'm old enough to remember that, that's definitely changed my life.
Rebecca Vasmant will be playing at the Kelburn Garden Party on July 5.