Freshta
Photography by Jai Toor
Freshta! It’s been a minute, how have you been?
I have actually been really good, I feel really blessed in the sense that this past year has been the best year of my life which I know is crazy to say and I feel so privileged to be able to say it but I just feel like everything has come together and goals that I’ve wanted to reach over the next five years have literally happened in the space of one! So I feel very, very, very lucky to be able to say that, but yeah I’ve been great, I’m happy and excited for the year.
You recently moved from Birmingham back to your home city of London, what kept you in Birmingham for so long and how come you decided to come back?
So, I went to university in Coventry, which is about 20 minutes away on the train from Brum. For my final year of uni, if I’m honest, I didn’t want to go back to Cov – the town wasn’t for me, I’m too much of a city girl! I ended up getting an apartment in Brum city centre, I had some friends there and I knew a little about the music scene plus it was an easy commute. Honestly, I just thought to hell with it, which looking back was such a brave thing to do. I spent that year in Birmingham then just ended up staying there afterwards because I was comfortable. I think a lot of people have this idea or stereotype of what Birmingham is or used to be but especially now, I love it there. The city’s so up and coming, the people are lovely and family-orientated and it’s just so cheap! But yeah, in my head I always knew I wanted to come back to London I just didn’t know when so it wasn’t necessarily planned but eventually, I ended up getting a job in London after lockdown which is why I moved back so everything really fell into place. I definitely appreciate my time in Brum and I haven’t ruled out going back some time in the future.
You’ve been DJ’ing for a minute now. What inspired you to get into that space and what have your experiences been like as a South Asian woman within the field?
Growing up, I began to find my identity and come out of my shell just after high school, I’d go to a lot of raves where I became exposed to some of the music that I now mix: grime, bass, drum and bass, etc. What inspired me most was definitely seeing female DJs on massive stages or at The Warehouse Project or Fabric even, who would mix these genres. I completely fell in love with it! I remember going out with friends and I’d be like “we have to catch this person, we can’t miss so-and-so’s set” – DJ’s like Madam X, Flava D, Barely Legal. I also realised during this time that I cared about music way more than others around me, like I was keeping up with releases, I knew all the tunes and all the names. Everyone would say if you want an event to go to, just ask Freshta - she always knows what’s going on. I just really kept up with the scene! That’s when I felt like I can’t let this go, I wanna get involved and find a way to be a part of this so I might as well learn how to mix for starters. Before I started going to these kinda events I didn’t really have any particular hobbies or interests so soon after I figured hey, why not teach myself how to DJ, surely it can’t be that hard! Little did I know… [laughs]. So I bought my first controller while I was at uni and at first I had no clue what I was doing but eventually, with enough practice, I got better and better.
As for being a South Asian woman in this field, I think it’s obvious to see that there’s not many of us or that we’re not given the same opportunities as others. It’s like when I walk into a room or see a line-up full of white people, I’m aware that I stand out. Sometimes I might feel like I can’t be myself because there’s no one else around like me but generally it’s just stuff like that I notice. I haven’t had any particularly bad experiences but as we see the rise of this South Asian underground movement such as with Daytimers, it reminds me of the importance of having people around who are similar to you or perhaps from the same background/culture with similar experiences as you – I think that matters so, so much. That feeling like I can just be myself, I can be saying all these words and people know what I mean and I don’t have to explain myself, I can dress how I want! My mum’s Pakistani and more recently, I’ve been wearing more of her South Asian jewellery on nights out which I used to be too scared to do cause I felt like I would get hate-crimed or get certain remarks that would end up ruining my night. That’s why being with Daytimers, I feel like I can literally do what I want since we’re all the same in a sense and I really value that. Culture is everything.
Alongside being a DJ and radio host, you’re also in computer coding. From studying Human Biology at university, what led you to do a complete 180 career-wise?
You might’ve guessed by now I’m someone who likes to throw myself into the deep end. I love teaching myself new things even though it’s difficult at first since you’re completely outside of your comfort zone, starting from scratch you know, imposter syndrome levels are high. I think, because I’ve seen the rewards of it afterwards, it just makes the entire process so worth it and I wish I could convince everyone to push themselves out of their comfort zone cause otherwise you’re never gonna grow! When I was in my final year of uni, I saw a beauty influencer posting on Instagram about how she was doing this Python coding course and she tagged the company that hosted it and it was Code First: Girls. I looked into them and they were offering free 8-week courses in coding for young women and I thought this is something that I really wanted to do so I started with the web development course first. The only coding experience I had before that was when I use to play Neopets when I was younger and I would create a blog template and use HTML tags, which I feel many people can relate to since they used to do it on MySpace as well which is so jokes cause we all could’ve been coders but I don’t know what happened to us [laughs].
I was really inspired by the women hosting the weekly classes I attended, they were just like us in the sense they were also not from coding or computer science backgrounds but just decided to get into it and now worked at all these big companies. I loved the course and I knew this was definitely something I wanted to keep doing and when the pandemic hit in March last year, I signed up for the Python course to learn remotely of course, which I struggled with at first but I still had it in me that I wanted to continue in tech. I just felt like my brain deserved to work hard! Summer 2020 is when I basically decided I wanted to do this for sure. My mentor at Code First: Girls suggested I apply to this 16 week coding boot camp which was the most intense thing I’ve ever done but by the end I was ready to get into my first role. In terms of my degree, I always loved Biology but never really saw myself working within that field to be honest. I don’t regret it all though, the university experience taught me a lot and I’m grateful for the knowledge I got from that degree, however I worked in private healthcare for a bit and didn’t enjoy that, I wasn’t trying to work in a lab my whole life, so here we are!
You played a set at Fabric last October, definitely a milestone that. How did you feel about it and what went through your head as you prepared?
Fabric was a huge deal to me, I think the venue itself holds a special place in my heart. Like I mentioned before, I used to go there when I was younger and that’s where I discovered so many new artists and DJ’s. It meant a lot to me and I always said in my head that Fabric is the ultimate dream/goal, honestly I don’t know how it happened so quickly! It didn’t feel real to me at first, I got an email saying there would be a possibility for me to play and I don’t know it kind of just went over my head until I saw the poster for the night and I was like fucking hell my name’s on that, that’s crazy! Then when my friends found out they were absolutely freaking out and it hit me that yeah this is a big deal isn’t it? I closed Room 2 which, in my opinion, I’ve always felt was the better DJ room so it really was a dream to be playing there. In terms of preparation, my set was for the Daytimers collective who represent South Asian underground music genre however there wasn’t any pressure on me to particularly play just South Asian music, I was able to play lots of hard, heavy stuff - music to keep people moving after they’d had a long night.
Do you have any words of advice for young women looking to find their way in and break through the glass ceilings of similarly male-dominated creative industries?
One thing I would always say is perfect your craft. Whatever industry you’re in, whatever you’re doing I think it’s important to give it a 110% and in turn, you should know that you are doing the best you can and putting in all which will make you more confident. Leading onto my second point, Be confident in what you do so people can’t question you, doubt you or have anything to say. Confidence is something that you will have to gain with experience, I definitely was never this confident when I was younger! Confidence shines through when breaking through any sort of glass ceiling because people are less likely to doubt you and more likely to take you seriously. Another bit of advice I would give is don’t be afraid to ask for help, especially from other women in the industry. Use your resources well and contact people! I always say my inbox is always open, I might reply late but I will reply and give you all the advice I possibly can. A lot of people are willing to give out advice if you ask so don’t be afraid to ask.
As for resources, especially if you’re living in London, there are so many resources for you to find: funding, events, all this stuff. I remember when I was trying to learn about DJing, I’d go to all these events literally by myself and chat to people which I never thought I could ever do but I did! I talked to people and made connections that I still know to this day who give me advice or I would meet people who were on the same boat as me– shout out a girl called Collector based in Sheffield, I remember we met at Red Bull Studios and we both wanted to DJ and now we do which is so crazy! Lastly, I think imposter syndrome is something that every human gets but I think it’s important to not let that eat you up. You can have your moment of feeling like an imposter but you gotta get through it because realistically, it’s just something you brought onto yourself and it’s holding you back so you got to learn to have that moment and move on!
Who are some of your favourite artists that we should check out right now?
Right now, number one would be Anz. She’s released a project called ‘All Hours’ and I have been loving her productions over the last year or so, she’s really been taking the electronic music scene by storm and she’s someone that I love to see live and now that clubs and festivals are back, I’ve really been enjoying catching her sets. I think she’s so talented and deserves all the success that she’s currently getting. Another person I would say is one of my favourite artists right now would be an artist called SPD. He’s a DJ and producer, has a show on Subtle FM and recently released some music on Roska Kicks & Snares which is a record label. He tends to produce 130bpm bass heavy stuff but for this release it was what I describe as ‘heavy funky music’ – very percussive sounds but very bass driven which I love. Low End Activist is someone else I’ve had my ear to recently, I think he’s such a sick producer and he produces some pretty heavy tunes. He had a release on Sneaker Social Club where he collaborated with one of my favourite MCs and my best friend Razor on a grime 140bpm track which was so sick.
West, North, South or East London?
Oh my days, I obviously have to say West London cause that’s where I was born and raised! West is home man, nothing compares to where you grew up – everyone on your street has known you since you were a yout, you walk into your local corner shop and bossman knows you… nothing compares! Also West is the greenest part of London, I feel like you can just tell when you go to other places. However, I do live in East now which is crazy to me, I moved here this year and it’s weird cause I feel like I’ve never lived anywhere else in London. Like I said it’s not home, but I do love it and have been enjoying my time here – I feel blessed that I still live pretty central and not too far out. I’ve also enjoyed exploring East London, I feel like if I grew up in here I would have loved it the same but yeah, West is home man.
And finally, what’s been the greatest lesson you’ve learnt since high school?
Wow, where do I begin with this question? I’ve learnt a lot, a lot of stuff but the greatest lesson has to be… I feel like at the time when I was in high school, I felt undervalued based on the things that I thought made someone valuable at the time. I think as you grow older you learn that none of it matters. It doesn’t matter what you look like, doesn’t matter who you hang out with, doesn’t matter what grades you got or even what you do – I feel like as you get older you can really see what people value the most and that’s literally just how you are as a person. All the immaturity in high school like the popularity politics, none of that matters now and I feel like that is the greatest lesson I’ve learnt because your opinion on others isn’t based on things which are completely irrelevant anymore. It’s the idea of growth essentially and I’m grateful I can now see that. Anyway, that’s just scratching the surface though… there’s so much I’ve learnt since high school, I’ll save the rest for another day.
Check out Freshta’s Instagram
Interview by Dillon Gohil
The interview was conducted in collaboration with Issue #1 of Read More Speak Less.