Vivie-Ann keeps her head up and keeps on spinning

Standing over six feet tall in heels, rocking a shredded pair of leggings, and aggressively styled makeup, it’s hard to believe that DJ Vivie-Ann, the 26-year-old international party girl and second half of super blond DJ team Blond:ish, would describe herself as shy. When it comes to showmanship, Vivie-Ann doesn’t hesitate. “It adds to the fun of it. If you’re doing something everyday it kind of gets redundant so you need to keep changing things up just to keep things interesting for yourself and the people around you.”
You might not expect that this party girl studied Computer Science, but a couple years back you could have found Vivie-Ann in a lab at McGill University. She took up spinning five years ago while she was finishing university. “I just started by playing around in my living room with turntables and then I slowly started playing clubs.”

Vivie-Ann began gaining popularity after living in Italy for a short time. “I moved to Rome for six months and then I played there for three years, but I lived here. So I’d go there once a month. That’s kind of how stuff took off. When you’re there you let everyone know in North America, all your friends, that you’re playing there so when you come back they want to book you.”

When asked whether she’d been given any advantages by virtue of being an attractive female DJ, Vivie-Ann modestly replied, “well I don’t know I’m not one of them.” Vivie-Ann doesn’t attribute her success to the fact that she’s a woman. “Being a girl you have advantages but then you also have disadvantages. You know sometimes people don’t take you seriously. For the most part yes you do get more gigs, and you’re more of a spectacle or whatever, but if you don’t deliver, if you don’t earn the respect, then it doesn’t really take you anywhere.”
Vivie-Ann just released her first compilation album, Chez Nous 2, for a local label Mile End Records. Vivie-Ann gathered a variety of Montreal artists to make up the album. “The motive for the compilation was to bring together different pockets of the electronic music scene. At least that’s what I wanted to do, just because it’s so segregated. You know you never have the gay house people hanging out with the hipsters,” said Vivie-Ann. “So somehow I just wanted to bring it all together a little bit.”

This past Friday the compilation came home as Vivie-Ann spun the record late into the night at Cavo Night Club in the Old Port. The DJ had no trouble gathering donations for Dans La Rue, a charity organization, in exchange for copies of the album.
The compilation of easy-going house is reflective of Vivie-Ann’s personality. Vivie-Ann has learned to take some of the reviews of Chez Nous 2 in stride, including a negative review by The Concordian. “I thought it was hilarious. The review caught me a little off guard, because it was funny, but it was talking about me. Some of the comparisons were a little outrageous because there’s some really good productions on there,” said Vivie-Ann. “I thought it was a little unnecessarily rude but whatever, who cares, it was funny.”

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