It’s lucky number 13 for golden boy Riva Starr who won Best Breakthrough DJ at the 13th Edition of The DJ Awards in Ibiza earlier this week. Merrily picking up his coveted Kryptonite award, Riva said…
“woo hoooo hoooooo hooooooooo”
2010 has been a stellar year for Riva, since he smashed onto the scene in January with his critically acclaimed album ‘If Life gives you Lemons, Make Lemonade’ on Jesse Rose’s Made 2 Play. This spawned the single “I was Drunk” – one of the years anthems which was recently picked up by EMI / Positiva for re-release.
Riva has always been focused on trying something new after such a saturation of the same old house music, mashing things up, twisting those knobs to create an inimitable sound that has thrust him to the forefront of the house music scene, picking up an eclectic fan base along the way – from Annie Mac to Pete Tong, Tiesto to Riccardo Villalobos, Carl Cox to DJ Sneak, and Groove Armada to Sven Vath.
Partial to a bit of brass ‘parp’ and ‘oompah’, you never know what you’re going to get next with Riva; his sets are true testament to his vision of “mezcla” – Spanish for blending or fusion. No matter where he is playing, whether its Cocoon or Glastonbury, clubbers have been getting their freak on to his highly energetic sets.
Playing over 115 gigs this year alone, has been the perfect testing ground for his various remixes… from the monstrous remix of Cajmere’s ‘Percolator’, Reboot’s ‘Enjoy Music’ and Chris Lake & Ly’s ‘La Tromba’ aswell as the legendary Dennis Ferrer ‘Hey Hey’ – which was definitely one of the most talked about remixes of the year.
So a perfect way to celebrate the end of the summer season for Riva – however, there is no rest for the wicked… there are plenty more gigs in the pipeline including The Warehouse Project, Meltdown in the US & I Love Techno in Belgium. Riva is also concentrating on his label Snatch! which is currently on its 7th release, and is becoming a firm favourite in many a DJs record box.
Currently out is Riva’s remix of Butch’s “XTC”, Mihalis Safras “La Samba Di Chicos” and his remix of Lauren Pritchard’s “Not the Drinking” is coming out soon. Riva is also working on a new single and album, which is due out in early 2011.