Local Artist Profile

for Eloquence Magazine, January 2009

A Dynamic DJ Duo

by Michelle Viljoen

It makes their audience happy. And it makes them happy. It’s a great job, it's the life of a DJ.

Only a few months after partnering up as a DJ team, DJ’s Unjin and Mang Esilo managed to qualify for the final round of the Miller Fresh M DJ Contest in Seoul.

While the kind of electronic music they produce has yet to become very popular in Korea they are working hard to keep doing their dream job – dj’ing and making music.

Unjin and Mang Esilo met two years ago. They began talking music and eventually realised their shared interest can become a combined initiative. They started performing as a DJ-duo a few months ago.

When the Miller Fresh M DJ Contest came round they took part and recently made it past the semi-final phase.  The final is on December 31 at the W Hotel. “We are planning to incorporate sounds from nature into the set,” say Unjin.

Unjin is into futuristic music. “You have to create your own sound. With the nature music you can get in touch with the music,” he says.

Both DJ’s have been involved in music for years. Mang Esilo started dabbling with music from a home studio. Unjin started his music career in an indie rock band, then became interested in house and finally techno.

It’s hard to make a living with this kind of music, says Mang Esilo. This is partly because their kind of music is not very popular in Korea. “We want to go overseas. We’d love to do a world tour to places like Canada and Spain.”

Even they don’t eat well because making a living off this music is hard, they do love it and will keep doing it because “it makes people happy”.