House Ministers

Ivan is the first and only Indian deejay to play as part of the first official tour of MoS in India and he owns and runs the MoS franchise in Bangalore. Absolutely in love with India,Stone shares how she loves the high-pitched notes of Punjabi songs,especially those sung by women artistes. “I use a lot of bhangra beats in my mixes,and would love to incorporate the power pitch too,” says Stone. She has done a number of music collaborations with her deejay husband,David Cherish,for leading British television shows like Top Gear,X Factor,I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here and so on.

A collector of glam house and retro classics,Stone has her eyes and ears open for every kind of music. “It always helps to be prepared when you are playing in a market that spans from Europe to China,Singapore and India. One has to know what kind of music will get the crowd in the groove,” says Stone. With 18,000 plus songs on her iTunes,all neatly catalogued in files,folders,genres and styles,Stone says she needs three minutes to gauge the crowd and play accordingly. “Still,one does hit a roadblock,like the one I experienced in Russia,where the club was stiff and tough,” says she.

The high of a live performance and the buzz people get from a great piece of music,is what keeps Stone in the business. “Ours is an insecure profession. In the early 2000s,deejays playing house and electronic were facing a rough patch,as Bollywood remixes ruled,” says Ivan. But the music scene has changed dramatically.

With internet and music festivals,the crowd has given a thumbs up to house,electronica and underground music. “Clubbing culture is now becoming a rage in smaller cities like Chandigarh,Bhubaneswar and Cochin. People are demanding new sounds,music and experiences and we give them that,” says Ivan,who is also the man behind Videotheque,a new concept where he mixes music videos on an LED screen,in real time. He has also released a single,Music is My Life,with Mili Nair (who sang Badari Badariya on Coke Studio) and Swede Niklas Gustasson. “I was in Bangalore,Nair connected via Skype from Chennai and Niklas from Sweden,and we collaborated and made a song. That’s called world music,” he laughs.