A DJ needs what? Two turntables and a microphone?
Sure.
But scan any list of working DJs: you don’t have to recognize the names to see that the shortest path to success on the decks is more likely to be two turntables and testosterone.
If a woman’s going to make it she’s going to have to be tough. She’s going to have to be harder than the hardest man. She’s going to have to kick ass and take names, if only to make a point of forgetting them. Ptooie. Take that, DJ man!
Or not.
"She literally was the ‘sweetest’ person with the friendliest manner around,"
says DJ Spiltmilk, recalling his earliest encounters with DJ Sweetz, aka Mindy Cooper.
Ah. So she’s nice. Which means she finishes last, right?
Nuh uh, says Spiltmilk, himself the erstwhile dean of Edmonton’s breakbeat scene.
"Dj Sweetz has in a short time become Edmonton’s funky music icon and is a fast rising talent in the Western Canadian music scene."
But... but...
"Her music is so funky you might have to bust out a windmill!"
Well that settles it, then. Give us a minute to limber up our legs, pre-windmill. (It’s a breakdancing thing, duh!)
Cooper herself is modest about her accomplishments.
"Every city has a handful of female DJs now... I don’t think it’s as much of a hot commodity as it was five years ago."
But even she is hard pressed to name more than a handful of local or global breakbeat "shejays" (although she’s quick to acknowledge the contribution of Calgary’s scene-nurturing Mama Miche). And it’s worth remembering that it was five years ago–when every city didn’t have a handful of female DJs–that DJ Sweetz first laid her hands on a set of club turntables.
STARTING IS SUCH SWEET LORE, YO
Raised in Spruce Grove, Cooper describes her pre-Sweetz self as "free spirited," moving to Jasper and Vancouver before returning to Edmonton, where the stars began to align.
Working at local club Therapy–"working at the bar, working at the door, paying out the DJs"–Cooper got to know the promoters who would later employ to serve sounds rather than suds.
Meanwhile...
"I moved in with a friend of mine–DJ LP–and he just happened to get turntables at that time. Obviously, electronic music was all around me. I just started picking up his records and playing them and enjoying it, but it took me a while to really catch on because I got so frustrated and impatient..."
Eventually, however, she’d find herself hurrying home after work to practice her mixing. And practice. And practice.
After which, DJ LP–"he’d heard me play the same two records over and over"–stepped in once again, as Sweetz first "played out" at the 2001 New Year’s evening at Lush.
"Finally it was my turn to play and I was like, ‘No, I can’t do it, I can’t do it.’ And he was just like "Well, bye..." and he just left the record playing and someone had to take over... And that’s how I finally got up in front of people.
"It was great. My mom came out. I’ve got a picture..."
THESE BREAKS WON’T STOP
"House [music] is my first love, I love going out dancing to it, but I love to play breaks," says Cooper. "It makes me feel like a drummer. And I always wanted to play the drums growing up. I like that the beats give you room to move in between. You can set your own groove, and the way you can dance to it is a lot more fun."
With roots in the seminal funk experiments of James Brown, breakbeat is like rock and roll with a supple spine, funk with a booster rocket. It can be dramatic, joyous, or hilarious, and sometimes all three at once. It’s called "breakbeat" not only because it has traditionally featured drum samples from the instrumental "break" in R & B tracks, but also because it "breaks" the 4/4 pattern of house and rock. In the hands of a skilled artist, breakbeat’s magically syncopated rhythms makes you feel beats that haven’t been played.
And that’s just the half of it for DJ Sweetz.
"I think a lot of it has to do with the music I grew up with, the music that I like. I loved funk. I listened to hip hop growing up, like a Tribe Called Quest and De La Soul. I loved Stevie Wonder. He’s my musical idol. And I think all of that music, it is breakbeat, so I think that’s just why I’m drawn to it. I hear a 4/4 beat and it just doesn’t do anything for me, but if somebody plays a breakbeat, I’m just instantly asking, "Ooh... what’s that?"
FROM THE BOUTIQUE TO FORT KNOX
Breakbeat comes in many flavours, including the rump-rolling thump of funky breaks, the crunchy funk of nu skool breaks, and the acid-tinged bombast of big beat
DJ Sweetz, as you may have gathered, likes it funky.
"Do I ever!
"And I think funk has definitely had a comeback in breaks. I think
[Washington DC’s] Fort Knox Five has had a really big role in doing that, especially in bringing back the organic funk breaks."
She returns frequently to the Fort Knox Five and the theme of organic, feel good, mid-tempo breakbeat. ("That’s where my heart is: that’s my favourite kind of breaks.")
Asked for a starting point for a breaks neophyte, she recommends On the Floor at the Boutique by Fat Boy Slim and The Freestyler’s FSUK Volume 2. ("I think that the Freestylers in the early days had all of those elements like the b-boy, early ’80s style–lots of hip hop samples, that kind of stuff.")
A list of DJ/producers she favours includes UK scene granddaddy Krafty Kuts, along with Diplo, Krafty’s protégé A. Skillz, and Canada’s A-Trak. ("All of those guys are incredible DJs and producers, and make it sound better for guys like me.")
So when you ask her to describe her proudest moments, and you learn that they include opening for the Fort Knox Five and the Freestylers and Krafty Kuts, you realize that she’s actually played with most of her heroes.
"I really have. I'm so lucky," she says modestly, and then quickly–and sweetly–credits local colleagues like Spiltmilk and Mama Miche and the Subterranean Sound crew with enabling her ascent.
SHARING THE SUGAR
Audiences often don’t appreciate the challenges DJs face. Reading a room’s vibe and knowing how to light it up takes practice and intuition. Getting your records to the gig, on the other hand, requires upper body strength... and flexibility has a cost.
"I’ve been notorious for bringing far too many records," says Cooper. "And have hurt my back doing so."
She’s also had to DJ with frozen fingers while snow was falling on her records, to deal with vinyl-warping heat that gave her sunburn.
Technology is going to help with the portability–Cooper can now carry her entire music library on her laptop if she wants to–and the frigid fingers and scorched scalp can be salved by That Elusive Moment of Transcendence. It’s hard to explain how putting the perfect record on in the perfect way after the last perfect record can be a bigger thrill than your first kiss, a hefty raise, and that new car smell, all rolled into one, but...
"Nothing beats that feeling. Nothing has ever made me feel the way that does... The connection you get with an audience and playing a killer set is just un... real..."
More tangible, perhaps, is the way Sweetz has tried to lighten the load for the DJs that follow in her footsteps. She’s an ardent supporter of other female DJ, as the co-founder of Decibelle Productions and as an organizer of multiple woman-DJed club nights. She also keeps the broader community fed, as the breaks buyer for local vinyl retailer Treehouse.
"Sweetz has become a staple in Edmonton’s funky music scene," says Spiltmilk. "I am sure that she will continue spreading her love of all music for a long long long time..."
THE SWEETZ HEREAFTER
DJ Sweetz doesn’t use the word "career" to describe her future at the mixer.
"DJing is a hobby for me and I just love it," says Cooper. "I love that I can make people feel good... I feel that I’m so lucky to be a part of Edmonton history... electronic history."
So will DJ Sweetz be spinning when she’s 50?
"I don’t know if I’ll be playing out. But I’ll definitely still be playing. It’s been such a huge part of my life I could never give it up."
As it happens, the thing that got her thinking seriously about work was the selfsame thing that makes a career as a DJ difficult to contemplate.
"I think a lot of things changed for me once I had my daughter [who just turned four]. I mean I can’t just get up and go anymore... Getting out there takes a lot of work. It takes a lot of networking. It takes a lot of self-discipline. I think it takes producing for you to really get your name out there.
"Producing just isn’t on my plate. Eventually I’d like to do that. I’ve always imagined the beautiful studio in this home that I own, you know? And I’ll have that one day for sure."
And one day, in that studio/home of the future, her precious collection of records will take on an added layer of significance and perhaps lay the table for a fresh generation of Sweetzness.
"It’s important for me for my daughter. You know, I think about one day she’s going to go through all my records and get another sense of who her mom is."
