Though his musical alter-ego, DJ Sta, is now known around the world for the dance music he’s remixed and produced, Stu Freen started out as a Queen’s student, before the Internet stepped in and made him electro’s newest blogging sensation.
“I studied cognitive science—nothing music-related at all,” he said. “It was kind of a hobby. I was a DJ at Alfie’s on Friday nights and I’d be mixing mash-ups, and when I started making my own songs, I’d bring in those tracks and put them on.
“I was throwing lots of parties with my housemates and our friends who like electro—there’s definitely an outlet for it at Queen’s.”
Sta became interested in DJing and dance music in high school, when he was initially drawn to hip hop scratch DJs. From there he became interested in house, the genre he works in now.
“[House music] is club music with a four-four bass. It’s pretty soulful,” said Sta, ArtSci ’07. “Now it’s more computer-generated, but it used to be like disco with drum machines.”
There are two sides to DJ Sta: one is the DJ who mixes records live in clubs, and the other is the musician in his own right, remixing and producing songs on his computer—which he began from his bedroom in Kingston. Because a lot of dance music is created on a computer, it’s easy for a community to build online, with small-time DJs all-over the world blogging their own tracks and maintaining Myspace sites.
“The things that I’m having success with these days is making my own music,” Sta said. “Once you start being known for that, you can start travelling places and people already know who you are. … It’s pretty much Internet-based. I can go anywhere in North America and find a community. It’s amazing that I could do all of this with just my computer and a ghetto stereo system.”
Sta seems surprised at his own success, or maybe the speed with which it has all come together. His remix of Timbaland’s song “Give It To Me,” after being posted on his own blog for about a year ago, was quickly posted on higher-profile music blogs.
That song, as well as follow-ups such as Sta’s version of Beyonce’s “Irreplaceable” and a hilarious mix to the theme from the ’90s TV show In Living Color were just as eagerly spread around the Internet—so much so that Sta’s still living off those successes.
“I did a couple big remixes last year, and they did really well,” he said. “So right now it’s just day-time television and dance music.”
It was on a blog that Sta was first discovered by Adam Freeland, a British DJ and producer whose label, Marine Parade, has become representative of some of the best electronic music being made. Last year when Freeland played a gig in Toronto, Freen drove up to Kingston to meet him.
Sta’s debut album, called In Living Color, to be released next February, has been getting radio play in the UK and is being blogged about in . Though his next-door neighbours may not know who he is, people all over the world are anticipating release of the as-yet unheard tracks on Sta’s album. With plans to travel to Miami later this winter and to Australia for the first time this summer, Sta’s name is growing in the world of dance music—a world Sta says is heavily marked by its own globalization.
“It’s similar crowds wherever you go,” he said. “I can go to Atlanta and it’ll be this big crowd of hipsters and then I’ll go to L.A. and it’s pretty much the same.” Hear Sta’s music at myspace.com/stafree
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