International DJ Roger Sanchez invites to his villa in Ibiza to discuss house music, CDJs, Ibiza, architecture and career highlights. He recalls getting inspired by a DJ friend back in the Bronx,
‘I just remembered looking out onto the floor, and it was packed, and just thinking “I would love to be able to rock a crowd like that”.’
That was the moment I decided that DJing was something I wanted to pursue. In his early DJ days he was really mixing it up; blending the hip-hop tunes of his roots with breakbeat and early electro beats and anything from James Brown to Afrika Bambaata.
Roger started off promoting at clubs like Mars and the Tunnel in New York, doing his own parties, organising whole promotions teams and drawing big crowds.
It was the tune Love Dancing that that was his first real big club success. Roger used to put on a night called Ego Trip in New York. It was picked up by a fledgling label at the time called Strictly Rhythm.
‘I had just done one track called Dreamworld, by Ego Trip for a label called Quark’. A&R Gladys Pizzaro heard and liked the record and put Roger in the studio.
From there came Love Dancing, which in turn became the big tune played by legendary Brooklyn DJ Tony Humphries, who used to have a residency at Club Zanzibar in New Jersey. The DJ picked up Roger’s track and it really took off. From that point Roger started touring the UK and Europe and rose rapidly in the scene, all off the back of Love Dancing.
Roger is now on his fourth record label, Stealth Records, following One Records, Narcotic records and Arsenal Records.
