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Favorite ThisHow REZZ has taken the dance music industry by storm [INTERVIEW]

Published: December 23, 2015

By: Anand Harsh

REZZWhat's that old saw? How do you get to Carnegie Hall?

Practice, practice, practice.

Isabelle Rezazadeh has taken the adage to heart. Having only plopped herself down in front of a computer in her small town of Niagara Falls, Ontario with the intent to produce 25 months ago, the rising DJ superstar has already contributed to a compilation on Deadmau5's label, released a 3-track EP on Skrillex's OWSLA, and landed herself massive festival appearances at HARD and the upcoming Reaction NYE just outside Chicago. REZZ has arrived.

Spending upwards of 14 hours a day mainlining tutorials, tweaking her Ableton sessions, and studying the works of her audio heros, Rezazadeh walked the walk until her tunes were good enough to get out there. As fans and artists alike began to stumble across her Soundcloud feed (Attlas, chief among them), the demand for REZZ continued to grow and grow. We named her as one of our Top 10 Breakout EDM Artists of 2015, and now we got a chance to catch up with Rezazadeh and see if this whirlwind of attention has gone to her head. (Spoiler alert: it hasn't.)

It's been just over two years since you sat down and seriously started producing. How many months of non-stop practicing and studying and trial and error before you started to really develop your own signature sound; before you thought to yourself "Holy shit...I've got it."

I'd say about 6-7 months in I was already creating music that I was feeling a lot. Perhaps the technical side was lacking, slash may still be lacking, but if I enjoy the enjoy the idea and think I got my vibe across with the song, then I'm happy.

You bring this heavy, almost post-industrial sound to your dance floor gems. What was Isabelle the teenager listening to that ingrained this really dark, apocalyptic edge? Or are you actually sunshine and rainbows on the inside?

I loved bands like My Chemical Romance, Bring Me The Horizon, Metric, etc. I always liked darker music, but me as a person is actually quite the opposite. My personality is very vibrant and I'm generally a very happy/optimistic person. There is a dark side to me, as there is in every person I'm sure, but I just choose to expose it via music.

REZZ eye handNiagara Falls isn't a huge hotspot for dance music (or so I'm assuming). How did you develop a thirst for the sound and even determine it to be a career path? Did you have friends or mentors around you, or has this been a pretty solitary path for you?

Basically, I only knew a select few people in Niagara Falls that liked dance music, so I found myself taking buses to Toronto to go to events - even by myself. I loved it so much and just always wanted to go to shows.. it wasn't until I saw Deadmau5 that I really became inspired to create music. Once I started, I became obsessed... and now I'm here!

It's difficult to imagine a 20-year-old being into techno in 2015. While it's never gone away, and it appears to be coming back into fashion, how did you find your way to it? Songs like "Serenity" and "Lucifer" certainly have techno flavors, but of course you're injecting your own essence.

As I'm sure most artists do, I've just taken inspiration from a ton of artists and developed my own sound through that - but also it has a lot to do with having a clear vision. I know exactly how I want the crowd to feel, look, and act during my shows, and I know exactly how I want to feel when I listen to my music, so I create accordingly.

What's next for you? A new EP? More singles? A full-length? Are you wanting to play more shows, or spend more time in the studio? What's really pulling you creatively at this fun place in your career?

EP next month, label to be announced. 4 new songs in the EP. Also, I have a lot of shows coming up. Aside from that, I want to create more music and collaborate with artists in 2016, because I haven't done that before.


Tags: ElectroHouseTechno