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Hello? Jon Lockley. My name is Jin, a reporter at Partyluv.com. I'm glad that I had a chance to have an interview with you. These as follows are the questions. What is the significance of your name, Jon Lockley? How did you get that name? Hi. My real name is Jonathan so I just shortened that up to Jon and Lockley is my mother's maiden name. I'm really close to my mother's side of the family so I decided to use Lockley. There are no other djs with the Lockley name so that played a part in me choosing it, too. To me Jon Lockley sounds much better than Jonathan Porter. Dont you think so? Why did you first get into DJing? I have always been fascinated by all kinds of music and when Hip Hop became popular in the 80s you really started to see djs doing phenomenal things with turntables. I remember the first time I saw one of those djs scratch. It just blew my mind. Ever since then I wanted to be a dj. Oddly enough, I didn't get into djing until many years later when I was enrolled in University. I heard the Chemical Brother's "Brother's Gonna Work it Out" on my college radio station. That was the turning point. I decided to start dj'ing the very next day. Who and what are your influences? Oh there are too many to name but first and foremost it was my grandfather. He was an accomplished musician himself and tried to point me in the right direction. Others like John Digweed, Sasha and Deep Dish had a big influence on me when I first started djing. My favorite dj/producer of all time is Matthew Dekay, These days I'm influenced more by Electro House than anything else and artists I like include Deadmau5, Wolfgang Gartner, Miles Dyson and Lazy Rich. What was the first progressive house/break beat record that you ever bought? That was so long ago and I'm so terrible with the artists and track names of the records I play. I can tell you this, though. When I first started djing, Keoki was really big and he was signed to a record label called Moonshine. I ordered Moonshine's entire record collection. Those were my first House records. How would you describe your sound? What's your music style? Well my bio lists Electro, Progressive, and Breaks as my musical style. I have been influenced by these three styles the most and try to incorporate them into my sets whenever I play. A friend has described my style as this," . . . he flawlessly merges the sounds of bass heavy break beats with progressive melodic house so easily and so fluently that he is envied by his peers." Add in some Electro and I think youve got it. In the end, I think a djs sound should evolve as music evolves. Please introduce your songs and project youve done. The first track I released was a remix a friend and I did for a remix competition. It was a Christian Paduraru track called Reality. We won the competition so Christian released the song on his record label Worldwide Exclusive Records. Shortly thereafter, I signed with Next Level Recordings and released my first original release called Switch the Club Back. I was very surprised because the breakbeat remix I did under my alias Boss Hawg actually got to #6 on the Beatport top 100 Breakbeat Chart. My next release was Another Planet. It got to #34 on the chart so I was pleased with that, too. The latest release Neer-do-well seems to be doing well. I think the Freakhouze remix got to #6 on Trackitdown.net's Breakbeat top 100 Chart. And the next release, which was a collaboration with Freakhouze, is out now. It's called Alive. Please tell us about your latest project. Currenlty I'm doing some more collaborations with Freakhouze. I will be remixing some of his songs from his new album, too. In addition, I have some original material that I'm working on at the moment. Stay tuned . . . What has been your biggest gig so far? They are all big gigs, even the small ones, haha. I'd have to say a gig I did early in my career. It was an event for the energy drink company Red Bull. It was a 24 hour event and there were only two djs booked for the event, myself and another mainstream Radio Station dj. The other dj was supposed to come in and give me a break, but he had some problem and couldn't make it in so I ended up djing for the entire time. There were a lot of people and it was a tiring gig, but it paid well and I got to see what my limits as a dj were. When you are up there do you have a play list or do you read the crowd? A few years ago I would have an idea of what I wanted to play but no real play list. I would just go in and read the crowd. I think every dj has to do that or theyre going to be in trouble. These days I'm using a program called Mixed in Key which organizes your music into the key of the song so that when you mix songs together you don't have out of key clashes. Mixed in Key kind of forces you to play certain songs because they have to be in the right key, but I try to make sure all of my songs are good so that I don't have to worry about reading the crowd as much. In your opinion, how important is it to be able to read the crowd during a set and adapt to them? I think it is very important. Sometimes in Korea, especially with the Korean djs, you'll have Club owners and managers telling you what to play which to me really undermines the dj. Its the djs job to know what to play. It's the djs job to read the crowd. I guess that just comes with experience. What's your favorite track that you like to play? It's a bit of an older track, maybe it came out last year sometime. I always keep it in my bag and try to sneak it into my set, usually at the end of my set because its a good one. It's called More by Junkie XL featuring Lauren Rocket(Matthew Dekay mix) Is there any interesting episode in terms of making music? Yes. My first song I released Switch the Club Back. I worked on the Original mix for about 2 or 3 months. I wanted someone to do a Breaks mix of it and had asked several people but they were taking too long. I decided to do the Breaks mix myself under an alias, Boss Hawg and finished it in 2 days. The Original mix sold well, but the Breaks mix charted at #6 on Beatport and it only took me 2 days to do it. I thought that was quite funny. And many people didn't even know I was Boss Hawg. Who would you like to work with in the future? I would like to continue to work with Freakhouze. His production is top notch and I think we can go places. Id like to work with some of the people I mentioned earlier, too. I'm open to remixing anything, just as long as I can work at my own pace, haha. I heard that you have a Korean wife. Can you tell us how you decided to live in Korea? And how is it living in Korea? Yes. Ive been married for almost 3 years now and we had our first child Peyton 18 months ago and she really keeps me busy these days. I'll have her djing before long so watch out. As for Korea, I came here in 2002. Originally, just to stay for a year. I liked it so much I stayed for another year, then another, then another and so on. And I've always lived in Daegu. They say its the best place to live, work and play in Korea and it must be because I'm still here. Do you look up to any other people? Sure. I look up to my parents, family, professors, and friends. I look up to people who I can learn from. I look up to Electronic artists who are pushing the envelope. I look up to people who stay true to themselves. And I look up to people who aren't satisfied with the status quo. What tips can you give the local scene here in Korea? The scene in Seoul seems to be doing pretty well. The scene in Pusan is getting better. I think Daegu still has a long way to go. It's still very much Hip-Hop oriented. There are so many different types of Electronic music and there are a million websites and magazines devoted to promoting it. If you truly do like this type of music, please get out and support it. Go to those parties, clubs and festivals. What images and emotions do you want your music to invoke in the listener? This answer is so cliché but it's the truth. Music is a very subjective experience which is different for everyone .When people listen to my music, dj mixes or dj sets I want them to feel like they've been taken on a journey. The images and emotions that arise are entirely up to them. Whats your goal as a musician? My short term goal as a musician is to keep making good music that I'm proud of. For the long term I want to keep learning more about music production in hopes of applying it to future music projects. And maybe take some piano lessons, haha Whats next for Jon Lockley?! I'm going to keep producing, keep djing and eventually achieve all of my goals. Youll be playing in Club VERA on the 12th of September. Whats the main point in your playing for clubbers to pay attention to? Right. First of all, I hope everyone comes out. I'm sure it will be a good party with Freakhouze, UJN and myself. I intend on bringing the heat and have a few special tricks up my sleeve. You'll hear some tracks you won't hear anywhere else.. And remember to check out http://jonlockley.buildingmy.com for everything Jon Lockley. Thanks. Thank you for your faithful answers. Have a nice weekend and I look forward to the breathtaking CLUB VERA party. Sincerely, Jin