They call Nicole Moudaber one to watch. But it’s fair to say she’s been making waves for well over 15 years now. Nigerian-born Moudaber, deservedly recognised as a talented ‘dark house’ DJ and producer in the most recent phase of her dance music career, first entered clubland as an ambitious promoter.
Raised in both Nigeria and Lebanon, she discovered the well-crafted house sounds of Junior Vasquez and Danny Tenaglia whilst on a visit to New York in 1989, and was determined to bring them back to the Middle East. Monumentally, Moudaber became the first person to introduce dance music and big name guest DJs to Beirut. Her landmark ‘Trashy Renaissance’ parties, launched in 1996, attracted major spinners such as Paul Van Dyk and Anthony Pappa at a time when the Lebanon was emerging from civil war – the Trashy dancefloor was quite literally squeezed between a bombed-out mosque and cathedral; a perfect symbol for the unifying power of dance.
Moudaber, of course, would relocate to London soon after and evolve her promotional passions through seminal tribal night Soundworx, located at Turnmills. She was also branching out into label management, taking on influential UK imprint SouthEast Recordings – home to Christian Hornbostel and Tom Stephan among others. That she would expand horizons again to focus on her own production and DJ work was inevitable. Her rise, since that time, has been meteoric.
Nicole Moudaber
“I like to think I’m a creative person, someone who is able to express themselves through all forms of music – promoting, DJing, making records,” she opens. “Music is music. I always wanted to make it myself but there was never the right time or the right studio. I started DJing at Soundworx and everything kind of moved on from there.”
Over the past two years, Moudaber has had her increasingly well supported tech-house and techno creations signed to a top-draw, if totally diverse set of labels including Azuli, Defected, Yellow Tail and Plastic City. Forthcoming track No Reason Why, signed to Carl Cox’s Intec Digital label, has just been featured as part of Radio 1’s Essential Selection (Pete Tong referring to its author as a ‘rising star’) and another EP due out next month on Steve Lawler’s VIVa Music imprint is promising similarly spectacular things.
All the while Moudaber’s DJ commitments are going through the roof, her current weekly Ibiza residency at Church On Sundays (Es Vive) complimented by dates at Space and Privilege, gigs in Germany and an appearance during London’s world renowned SW4 festival, August 28-29. Moudaber will actually be playing SW4’s Bedrock arena alongside John Digweed.
“I can’t wait for that one” she beams. “It’s on such a large scale. I’ll do what I do; growing up in Nigeria means dark drums and tribal percussion will always be part of me. But there will be surprises. I’m going to test my newest material as well as play some of the tracks that have solidified my reputation as an artist.”
Moudaber can count Tenaglia and Cox among her most ardent fans, and friends. The former recently ‘MySpaced’: “I am proud of the work you’ve been doing lately;” the latter has name-checked her as ‘Most Underrated DJ of 2009’. Things, then, are undoubtedly speeding in the right direction; speeding in the right direction too, it seems, for fellow deep ‘n’ dark four-to-the-floor females like Magda, the jack-happy, minimal loving Pole, and sassy Swede Ida Engberg, whose unique strain of Nordic electronica turned thousands of heads (and ears) at last month’s EXIT festival.
Watch Ida's EXIT set on b@ TV
Engberg has been riding a steady wave of interest since the release of 2007 tech smash Disco Volante; and Minus-affiliated Magda, voted by Resident Advisor users as one of their ‘Top 10 DJs of 2009’, was recently honoured with an invitation to record one of RA’s prestigious podcast mixes. That said, she’s only the sixth woman to have compiled one and there have been a whopping 217 to date.
In clubland’s past the sudden emergence of female artists such as Sonique and DJ Rap caused major if repetitive debate about a male-dominated and deeply chauvinistic dance music scene. The regular activity of other, more durable names like Lisa Loud, Lottie and drum & bass-er Storm stoked that debate and suggested times were changing, but what, today, is the reality of things? Have things really changed?
“I think it’s a completely different ballgame” Moudaber asserts. “It’s almost a cliché to talk about women making their mark in club music. Just look at the internet, it’s not only opened our scene to all sorts of new sounds and influences, but new artists of both sexes and with equal talent. In the digital age, I think the music industry is a lot more open and a lot more focused on new music rather than anything to do with image, gender or race.”
Point taken, and yet those podcast stats are utterly compelling; firm evidence, surely, that males are still hogging the higher-profile rungs on clubland’s career ladder. One would be forgiven for thinking that there must be occasions on which sexism or cronyism rears its ugly head.
“Maybe back at the start of things but I honestly think that’s a cynical view” Moudaber confidently answers. “A lot of men are high-up in the industry, yes, and particularly within techno – it is after all a very strong, masculine sound. But right now there’s never an occasion when I, as a female artist, feel all that affecting what I do or want to do.
“And there really is a lot of new female talent coming through; more perhaps than at any point before. The internet is paving the way, but, me, I’m honestly just focussing on my own passion for the music, and sharing that energy, and those deep, sexy grooves, with everyone. The club scene is so amazing right now; you just have to try and ignore the pigeon holes and lose yourself in the beats. It’s all about the beats.”
Moudaber is, as ever, drumming up big interest.
