Exclusive Interview with NERVO

NERVO are amongst the all-time top-ranking female DJs in the world, currently ranked on the #45 spot on DJ MAG’s Top 100 DJ list. They play over 200 shows a year, all over the world, at the biggest clubs and festivals.

Siam2nite had the opportunity to have an exclusive interview with NERVO, shortly before their performance at Don't Let Daddy Know Thailand on 12th February.

You are sisters, born in Melbourne, the second most populous city in Australia. As DJ and production duo “NERVO” you are are amongst the all-time top-ranking female DJs in the world - currently ranked on the #45 spot in DJ MAG’s Top 100 DJ list. How did you get in touch with electronic dance music in the first place?

We used to be full time song writers, working purely for other artists. When a song we wrote for David Guetta and Kelly Rowland - “When Love Takes Over” , won a grammy, we thought we should give it a try ourselves at being artists. Besides, we had so many songs on our hard drives that we thought it would be such a waste to leave them there - so we had to become artists to release them. And NERVO was born :)

You play and produce a mix of Electro- and Progressive House. How would you describe your own music in just a few words? What is distinct about it?

We are constantly evolving but I would say our sound is big room melodic. We came from pop music so we love a melody and also a great top line.

In 2009, you co- wrote the Grammy Award-winning single “When Love Takes Over” for David Guetta feat. Kelly Rowland. It was voted by Billboard as the #1 Dance Pop Collaboration of all time. Your first Beatport #1 song was “The Way We See The World” – which was the official Tomorrowland 2011 anthem. What more recent tracks would you recommend as an introduction for someone that is not yet familiar with your music?

Our debut album Collateral reached #1 on iTunes and some really great songs and collabs came off that album including Haute Mess, Hey Ricky, The Other Boys, Reason, You’re Gonna Love Again, We’re All No One, and It Feels. More recently we have released People Grinnin’, Anywhere You Go, Forever Or Nothing, and Alone. Also stay tuned for a big release on Feb 10th called “In Your Arms” that we really love. If People aren’t sure what we are about then a good way to get to know us is to check out our spotify. We have a load of releases coming and we also put a lot of energy into our NERVONation playlist.

You play over 200 shows a year, and you have played all over the world at the biggest clubs and festivals – including Sensation, EDC, Ultra and Tomorrowland. What were the best and the worst gigs you ever played and what were the funniest things that occurred during your performances?

Sometimes we have technical issues but those are few and far between so we have been pretty lucky. One mess up that comes to mind is when we were finishing our Tomorrowland Main stage set and someone from the audience threw a T-shirt towards us, anyway, this T-shirt ended up falling on a CDJ and stopped the music. We thought we had accidentally knocked something but soon realized it was the flying T-shirt that had stopped the music. Mim quickly jumped on the microphone to fill the silence and I (Liv) cued up to start the track again. Maybe the crowd didn’t realize what had happened but we sure did.

We have had girls throw bras at us, boys propose to us and we’ve had some pretty funny signs where people ask to eat pizza with them or they ask us for our clothes because they like a jacket that they have seen us wear on Instagram. That’s pretty funny hey!

You are the highest-ranking and - besides Miss K8 (#88) – the only women in the DJ Mag’s Top 100 DJ list. How is it to be attractive females in this mainly male dominated business? Is it a gift or curse?

We feel very blessed to be the highest-ranking female DJ’s in the world and are chuffed that our fans keep voting for us. We would love to be inspiration to any girls in any career fields to help them achieve their goals/dreams. We worked and still work very hard at making music and we really believe that this determination, hard work and passion helps us succeed. We recently did a campaign for our “People Grinnin’” release alongside Made By Me in Australia that helped show how women can get into engineering and that even though some of these fields are male dominated it shouldn’t stop women from going after what they want in any profession.

You teamed up with “Fuck Cancer” and launched your own breast cancer awareness campaign called “TITTIES TITTIES YEAH”. What can you tell us about it and where can people learn more about it?

We will continue to do everything we can to help raise money and awareness for Breast Cancer. Our mum is a survivor so we saw first-hand how important charities were not only for cancer victims but for their families, providing emotional support and also of course to the research that goes into finding a cure and the hospitals who care for the patients. We started #TittiesTittiesYEAH so we could raise money and donate it to various hospitals or organizations and can’t wait to do more in 2017!

You have played at Thailand’s biggest festivals: Sensation Thailand 2014, Waterzonic 2014, Road To Ultra 2015 and Together Festival 2016. Did you keep your previous performances – and Thailand in general - in good memory? What can the Bangkok crowd expect from your upcoming performance at Don't Let Daddy Know Thailand?

We always have incredible memories of Thailand - it is actually one of our favorite places on earth. The people, the culture, the food, the vibes - we would love to live there one day or at least spend a few years there. This time when we come back we will be playing a lot of new tracks that we will be releasing in 2017. We can’t wait to see you all!