This is Disruption
This is Disruption podcast explores the pursuit of creativity and shares the stories of the fearless creators in street art, graffiti, music, photography and beyond, who boldly challenge the status quo, break barriers for others and share their work unapologetically. Each episode is a deep dive interview exploring the lives of artistic risk takers, exploring their motivations, their inspirations, and their take on the power of art, in whatever form they make it in.
The podcast is hosted by Irish street artist and DJ, Did by Rua, based in London.
This is Disruption
DJ Anverso: Revolutionising DJing with Innovation and Nature
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I had a serendipitous encounter with a kind stranger at Amsterdam Dance Event this year, who turned out to be the ingenious DJ / Producer Anverso, also known as Tom Vanderbauwhede. Since hearing his story, I've become so personally inspired by the limitless possibilities in DJing and I knew this was a story that had to be shared.
This episode talks us through his musical journey from his first show on a pirate radio station in Belgium at the age of 10, to the peaks of the Matterhorn, where Anverso's innovative spirit has redefined what it means to be a DJ. His passion and tenacity is evident - from manually calculating beats per minute in his youth with a stopwatch, to revolutionising modern DJing with home designed portable setups in stunning remote landscapes. His story is one for all aspiring creatives, demonstrating that breaking free from convention is the path to true artistic expression.
Anverso shares the grit and innovation involved in developing a portable DJ booth that conquers the harshest environments, from the cold of the Dolomites to the altitude of the Swiss Alps, all recorded for YouTube allowing us to join his experience of blending music seamlessly with nature's grandeur in his youtube channel (see the videos linked below).
This episode also unpacks the strategic and problem solving side of creativity, when dissatisfaction with existing algorithm discovery tools led Anverso to script his own method to discover new sounds. We touch on the intersection of music and AI, the emotional landscapes carved by artists like Bicep and Anverso's personal journey into music production. With insights into branding and entrepreneurship, Tom shares invaluable advice for aspiring artists, emphasising happiness and perseverance over immediate success and a passionate instruction to follow your dreams - you never know where they'll take you.
Check out DJ Anverso on:
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@djanverso
Instagram: instagram.com/djanverso
Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/djanverso
Mixcloud: mixcloud.com/djanverso
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Hello there. You are very welcome to. This is Disruption podcast, with me, your host Rua. This podcast brings you in-depth interviews with the fearless creatives in street art, graffiti, music, photography and beyond, who boldly challenge the status quo, break barriers for others and share their work unapologetically. Each episode is a deep dive into the lives of artistic risk takers, exploring their motivations, their inspirations and their reasons for their willingness to disrupt societal norms. Some of these stories involve revolutionizing their industries, while others are pushing the boundaries of legality with their art. Coming up on today's episode.
Speaker 2:In the mountains, stayed in the highest hut possible, woke up five o'clock in the morning and then with my backpack, and the first time I had a problem with altitude, so it was too high. I stopped at 3750 meters because it wasn't enough air that I could breathe. I played my set. It was extreme cold, minus 25. The wind was blowing very hard, 50 kilometers per hour. It was heavy, but I was so convinced I wanted to do that when the sun was coming up it was like magic. Wow. This is why you do it. It's never too late and I can prove that myself. The most important thing is that you question yourself what makes you happy. It's not about making money. It's pursuing your dreams and go for what you really like. You don't need a whole plan. If you have step one of the plan, it's okay, and then the rest you'll see.
Speaker 1:In today's episode, I'm talking to DJ, producer and entrepreneur DJ Anverso. He is a legend with a super unique story. As always, this podcast is best enjoyed if you listen while you create something. Today, I am so excited to be joined by a really special guest with a super fascinating story. I met Tom van der Bouwheide, also known as DJ Anverso, at ADE in Amsterdam this year. Tom is a DJ, a producer, also an entrepreneur. He kindly shared some of his music with me at ADE so that I could play it on my radio show and since then I've learned that he actually has a super fascinating story. He has lived a fascinating life and has approached music in a really unique way. He is definitely a disruptor and I'm so excited to talk to him today. Hello, Tom, you are very welcome to the show. How are you doing?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm fine, Ruat. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1:I'm so excited to have you. This is going to be so interesting. When I heard your story I was like everybody needs to hear this story. So here we are. Thank you for joining me. To get us started and so that people can have an idea of of who you are and your background. Can you please tell us a little bit about you? Where did you grow up and how did you get into music?
Speaker 2:I grew up in Belgium, in the Flemish speaking part, because we have two parts, there's also a French speaking part In a little village a few thousand people were living there. Yeah, when I was 10 years old, I was already fascinated by music. I had a friend whose father had a radio station those pirate stations you know at that time, and so I was always asking my parents to allow me to go play with that friend, of course, because I was very interested in the radio station. And, yeah, one day there was one DJ not showing up. So, my friend, he said to me look, I have to go, but maybe you want to, to do a little. Uh, set here. So then I think I was 10 or 11 years old, so I'm thinking, wow, this is amazing. And so I just, yeah, played some records on on the radio. That was in the 80s, what was very funny.
Speaker 2:I'm a bit analytical as a person, mathematical. So I discovered somehow that there was something like beats per minute, that this existed, and because there were no lists of BPM of records, or there were no scanners or you know like software to analyze records, so I just discovered that I could count during 60 seconds every record that was played on the radio and I wrote down all these beats per minute. So I was really like having a list, a written list, because we didn't have a computer at that time, so a written list of beats per minutes, the of the charts. So when I was in that radio station I thought, okay, now I'm gonna look and try, because these turntables, they had pitch control. So I thought, okay, let's give it a try. So I played safe. I took two records of 116 beats per minute and I tried to mix them. I didn't have to pitch because these were like already in sync. So the only thing you had to do was, like, start exactly on the beat and then mix them. So I did that.
Speaker 2:My friend, an hour later he came back to the studio and said, hey, I was listening in the car to you on the radio. What did you do? So I was like I just mixed. How did you do it? Well, with beats per minute. So he really he asked me anything about it and then we started the radio show together. It was called the mix post. So that was really like the beginning of my call it a career in in djing and we had so much fun.
Speaker 2:Yeah, at that time we had cassettes, you know. So we we screwed them open, took like the first, I think seven seconds were not recordable on the cassette, so we cut them out so that you have like a direct start cassette. So then you could do samples. So we put like acapellas on these direct start cassettes and then we did rewind play and you had like samples. And then we had tape recorders, so the big ones with the big tapes, and with the big tapes you could like, yeah, put little pieces of tape in the loop, literally a loop. Then you could play that because depending on tempo of the track you could put the tape further or closer to the machine. And then you had loops and so we were playing a lot. It was so much fun, you know. So that was really the start, a long time ago.
Speaker 1:You were 10 or 11 when you were learning this and it was just a curiosity for knowledge and intrinsic rationality, being very analytical about things.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, yeah, I was intrigued. My nephew, he was also playing on a radio station, but he's like six years older, so I always was looking up to that guy. I thought, wow, he's a DJ on a radio station and he's very popular and you know. So I thought, okay, yeah, I think this is interesting. So that was like, uh, yeah, the start of everything.
Speaker 1:Yeah and how did it develop from there?
Speaker 2:well, I, uh, I think I did the show a few years and then my school results were not that good. So, my father, look, if you know everything from school as good as your beats per minute, you would have all your points, which wasn't. I had to stop for a while being a DJ, but a few years later I restarted, not in the radio show, but then I started playing on parties because everybody had like a sweet 16. Yeah, a little bit later I I was teaching at these parties. It was so much fun, but still with seven inches and and yeah, mixing is this has been my my whole life, something that I liked a lot, but it was like, yeah, before digital, you know well, things have changed so much and recently I had an unfortunate incident where I lost a lot of storage on my laptop and I lost my entire music library from Rekordbox Everything gone Now.
Speaker 1:I had it backed up in. The files were there, but all of my cues loops. Everything in Rekordbox is currently gone, which has been a nightmare. But hearing you tell this story, I'm so grateful that it's so easy to go in and set up my cue points again and reloop everything, because at least I don't have to be there with scotch tape on the set.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's true, that's true. But still, when I hear your story losing these cues is like it's, yeah, it's your memory playing. You need those cues because, yeah, that's how you do the transitions and everything. That's how you have it. You know these are the samples and so I can understand that's a lot of work that you have to redo then. So, yeah, that time was different. Yeah, more and more skill, like in the Middle Ages. You know craftsmanship. These days it's easier to mix because you have these sync possibilities, so just doing the mixing is not that difficult anymore. Now, yeah, the DJ is making a difference in different ways. Like I think record selection is very important Feeling an atmosphere, yeah, playing the crowd and then building something up. So it's totally different, but it's good. I like it a lot. These days we have so much possibilities, also in music production, what I'm doing also.
Speaker 1:Things have definitely changed so much. How did you feel going from playing on vinyl and mixing in a really manual, analog way to when you started djing, with the electronic possibilities that we have now, the way things moved along into having a cdj or a ddj, and how did you adapt to that?
Speaker 2:the first experience with digital, I have to say it was for me. It was like difficult to stop buying cds. You know, like I always was, yeah, I was like logic. First it was vinyl and then we switched to cds and then, yeah, people had mp3s and I was thinking, okay, but but yeah, you don't have them like physically, it's just a file. So and somewhere I think I I continued to buy cds just till the end of the 90s and then I switched in 2000 or maybe 2001, the moment that Apple launched the iPod I don't know when that was, but it should have been somewhere at that time, because there was Numark.
Speaker 2:They launched a mixing device that you could use with just one iPod. So you, you click the iPod in the middle and you could play from that iPod like two CDJs but then just two decks. And the moment I saw that I thought, okay, now I have to make the switch because that's a huge difference. So it's just like you don't need much. I did that at that time. So there was no syncing or something, it was still the old school mixing. But then with, uh, with mp3s. So I started putting all my cds in the computer, in itunes, to render them to convert them to mp3 and, yeah, to build up my collection digitally. So that was the first step and then later on, I bought the device of ellen and heat, the Zone 4D, because L&N Heat it's fantastic quality as a mixing device and the Zone is also MIDI controller so you could like play with a laptop. So that was also, yeah, it's really interesting.
Speaker 2:Bought some CDJs because just laptop DJing was not good enough. I missed the feeling of this, of the devices to control, like with the CDJs. That was, yeah, a big step forward and I'm still playing with these today. But, okay, often when I come somewhere, pioneer stuff is is there, already installed, so it's just like plugging in the USB stick. That's, yeah, over a period of 20 years, a huge evolution that we see Past couple of years. I'm also playing what I'm doing there, for example, in the mountains, I don't have the possibility to take a lot of gear with me and there I'm playing with an iPad and a controller and that's algorithm DJ as software, and then I have a controller from Reloop, like really portable stuff. What's interesting with the algorithm DJ software is that they have the possibility to filter out the stems. You have really acapellas if you want, and that changed the way I'm mixing today.
Speaker 1:A lot I have to say that's something that I am so excited to talk to you about. That's something that I am so excited to talk to you about. As you know, I love to go to really remote, hard to reach locations. You play a set, you record that set and then you share it on YouTube so other people can enjoy it as well. I have checked some of these out and, in one word, it is amazing, incredible. Such a unique, cool thing to do. And I saw the show, the set that you played on the matterhorn in switzerland mind-blowing. So please tell us, how did you come up with this idea and what inspired you to do it? What is it like playing on a mountain?
Speaker 2:yeah, I got the idea during the pandemic it. It was not possible to play somewhere, there were no parties, and I thought, okay, if I can't play for an audience, then why not just play for myself and record video? It was like the same time that in France you had Circle I don't know if you saw that they play on different locations, yeah, beautiful locations, and they, they invite people and one dj fantastic concept. I thought, okay, so the combination of me playing somewhere on a beautiful location, that could be something. And then I was thinking, okay, but it should be like a special location. So I uh started fantasizing about mountains and and, yeah, difficult to reach locations. And then it started, because it's like product development, you have to find a way how you can put everything in a backpack, how you can organize that, being able to, for example, take a plane, put everything. Then it's not just a backpack, because, yeah, you have, yeah, the backpack is not strong enough to uh to hold the gears, so it should be like foldable, small, portable, and then, yeah, you go somewhere and then you build it up and all of a sudden you have like a real booth.
Speaker 2:So it was lots of trial and error, because just power banks. That's not so easy If you connect these power banks. The first time I did it. So I saw like I found a power bank that was just strong enough to power my controller, but it was not powering the iPad. So which means that after 45 minutes or 60 minutes then it was finished because the battery of the iPad was empty. So I was thinking, no, that's not good enough. I need like something that I can power both controller and iPad with. But technically the iPad is with one cable, a lightning cable, connected to the controller. You don't have the possibility to connect an extra cable to the ipad, so it should be via the controller.
Speaker 2:And then I was searching for different alternatives and then you had problems with earth connectors, like the buzzing sound in the speakers. That was pretty difficult to to sort out the speakers itself, because these are portable speakers like Bluetooth speakers, but Bluetooth they have a delay. If you play as a DJ, the Bluetooth speaker always comes like half a second or a second later. So I really have to find something that I could play without delay. So I bought these Ultimate Ears Bluetooth speakers. So I bought these Ultimate Ears Bluetooth speakers and there was a guy in Germany who explained on YouTube that he found a solution by downgrading these speakers, the firmware downgrading to a certain level that you don't have that delay anymore. So I tried it out and then all of a sudden it worked like wow. So I could like what I heard in my headphones. I heard it also due to the speakers, so that was also something to to find out.
Speaker 2:Then the boot itself was complicated because it should be lightweight again, strong enough, have like a certain stand that weighs a few kilos, and so all these yeah things together and creating like a booth that looks like a real booth. It wasn't, it wasn't easy, but that was lots of fun. So first time I went to italy, to the trecime dolomiti it's like very nice place for a test. So I played a set there, but I just recorded the audio and not video there. And then I was thinking, okay, but if I see these beautiful locations, so why not doing video too? So and then, yeah, I was ready with the booth and with the setup for the sound, and then everything started again, because then I wanted to record video. I had already like a few gopros and then I took my iphone and and, yeah, just some stands to put everything up and tried that, so for a video recording, also with the drone Taibisa beautiful location, beautiful sunset, and that worked pretty well too. So I was really happy.
Speaker 2:And then I thought, okay, now I want to get like somewhere in the mountains. So I decided to go as high you can go close to the Matterhorn in Switzerland. That was a huge challenge. I wanted to go as high as you can go close to the Matterhorn in Switzerland. That was a huge challenge. I wanted to do a sunrise session. That was something I did in Florida. The sun coming up is so magic, so I thought, okay, doing a DJ set. The sun is coming up in the mountains, that will be fantastic. So all of a sudden, you have everything ready, but you also become a weatherman, you know, because, yeah, the sun is not always shining, so I had to look at a weather forecast every day. I had a flex ticket with uh no, the first time I did. The first time I went with my car. It's like 12 hours driving and then I went up because I knew that the weather would be good. So I thought, okay, I can do that. So then you go up in the mountains, stayed in the highest hut possible, woke up five o'clock in the morning, and then with my backpack and the first time I had a problem with altitude. So it was too high. I stopped at 3,750 meters because I it wasn't enough air that I could breathe. I thought, thought, damn so, now I'm here and I can do what I want. So I played the set, I recorded lots of footage and I learned a lot A month.
Speaker 2:One month later I went back at the right timing. Then I took the plane, flew to Italy, hired a car, went up to the same hut. But what I did then was the day before I already went to the highest place so that my body could get used a bit to the altitude, and that worked. Then I did the same Wake up at five o'clock in the morning, went up and then it's still dark. I arrived, I played my set.
Speaker 2:It was extreme cold, minus 25. The wind was blowing very hard, 50 kilometers per hour. It was really like it was heavy, but I was so convinced I wanted to do that. When the sun was coming up it was like magic. Wow, this is why you do it. So almost one finger froze off. I had a black finger.
Speaker 2:When I arrived home. It took like four or five months to heal, but it was, yeah, it was great and I had lots of footage. And I still remember that when I came back I looked at all the footage and I thought, damn, the recording did not succeed. So I have no footage. So it was like I freaked out. But then, yeah, I calmed down and when I looked a little bit better, it seems like it didn't record video.
Speaker 2:One camera recorded time lapse. So because it's time lapse, it's it's like a small file compared to video. So I thought I just looked at the file, I saw a very small file. So, no, it didn't work out. But with the time lapse I had a nice result too. So I think it took me like, yeah, 40 hours, 50 hours, to put the video together with the sound, to make something out of it for the Matterhorn, and I put it on YouTube. It has now like 95,000 views already. Yeah, that was a lot of fun. It was really like a big challenge. I think it was so complicated and, yeah, I pulled it off. I was really, really happy with that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I, I'm speechless.
Speaker 2:I have yeah, it's, it's adventure. You know I like new things, so, yeah, it's been part of my life. Yeah, always. This was also something like okay, try it out Even if you're not sure, just try and then you learn. And that was the proof. Yeah, Amazing.
Speaker 1:So it takes a lot to render me speechless, honestly. But a DJ risking frostbite and almost losing a finger because he's so determined to follow this dream that he has this vision and making it come true and then being able to share it with people it's mind-blowing. I'm so impressed by your problem solving, by your determination. What pushes you to keep going? What drives you?
Speaker 2:I think it's curiosity. When I'm always doing the same, I get bored. I need new things. That has been part of my life, always Like I'm an entrepreneur, I'm always having new projects and, yeah, I'm learning new things. I never studied pretty well. I always went for degrees, you know, but not like for points. I was interested in things, but if you study something, you have like maybe 20% is really interesting and all the rest is you take it because you have to. So I have like lifelong learning. I always did that because it's part of myself and that's the same now with product development.
Speaker 2:I really have to sort out everything from electricity and powers and cameras and learning like adobe premiere. I don't know if you know that's not easy. Working with all these other kind of softwares. Yeah, it's a journey, always new things. Like I just said before we started, I'm now working with ai a lot. That's, again, it's something new and I, I like it a lot. So, yeah, it opens the horizon. So I, it's something new and I like it a lot. So, yeah, it opens the horizon. So I think it's very important not to be happy with what you know. I think that's my motto.
Speaker 1:To always seek knowledge. Yeah, it's important. Can you tell me a little bit about your business? So I know, as well as being incredibly inventive in your passions and your hobbies, you are also an entrepreneur, which comes with so much problem solving and thinking outside the box. So can you tell us a bit about what you do in your day to day?
Speaker 2:Yes, my company is called Lemento. I started it in 2000. What we do is business strategy, branding and change management. So we help companies or organization, because sometimes it's a government organization. Most of the time the CEO or a director calls us, says look, we want to position different in the market. We feel like our brand is not following anymore who we are. Can you help us? And then we start with working on strategy to see, okay, what is your mission, what is your vision, what do you want to achieve in the future? How do you want to be different in the market? And once we know that, we'll look at the brand to see if the brand is still fitting that strategy, yes or no. If not, we change the brand.
Speaker 2:So I have people who work with me and these these are freelance people, but these are always the same people and then we really create like brands from scratch with the brand name, logo creation, corporate identity, you know the whole style guidelines, and then you have like communication tools and marketing campaigns, all that kind of stuff. And then the change part is then the third pillar, let's say, because you have to explain especially to employees, why you are doing this, because if they don't understand why this is happening. They will not be aligned with that new strategy and then it will not be a success. So it's very important to take the people with you. It will not be a success. So it's very important to take the people with you in that journey to make sure that everybody is going for the new North Star.
Speaker 1:Let's say and what was it that made you want to become an entrepreneur? Being an entrepreneur, you're working for yourself and you're building something that only you are responsible for. What made you want to become an entrepreneur?
Speaker 2:Yeah, the biggest driver was to be able to to make the decisions yourself. For me what? I worked for a few years for a boss and every day I had a good idea. So then I stepped in his office and said, hey, I have a good idea and no, no, we're gonna, we're not gonna do that. And the day after, hey, I have a good idea, no, no, no, no, I'm not going to do that. You know like I was thinking why not? And then I thought, okay, with all these good ideas, I'm going to start my own business. And then there is nobody who will say we're not going to do that. So that was really the main driver. And then we just started. And I have to say so, I studied applied economics at the university when I was around 20.
Speaker 2:And at the university, when I was around 20. And then, approximately like 10 years later, I went for an MBA. And that helped me too, because in that study of the MBA they really push you like to become an entrepreneur. So I was like, okay, let's go for it. So. And then we just started and just did it. Yeah, of course, in the beginning it's not easy, because you have to find customers, you have to explain what you do. You're not alone. Often other because you have to find customers. You have to explain what you do. You're not alone. Often other companies are doing the same, but but step by step, if you show your passion, then then people understand, because that's, that's what it's all about. So it's really like showing I go the extra mile for you yeah that made the difference till now.
Speaker 2:let's say so, really, I'm very customer oriented and try to help them as much as I can and create value for them, and that works pretty well, I have to say.
Speaker 1:You have obviously really delved into the passions that you have, whether it's being an entrepreneur or it's music and creative solutions that you find connected. Something that I find really fascinating, what you've done connecting your use of technology and your love of music was you told me that you had written a Python script.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, yes.
Speaker 1:That automatically creates a playlist for you on new releases on Spotify and that you listen to thousands of tracks every month due to this script that you'd written. That's incredible.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a certain day I wasn't happy anymore with Spotify's algorithm. They have their release radar and they show you, like, the new releases every week, but that's, yeah, 50 tracks or 70 or 80 tracks, most of the time, okay, the more popular bands or artists, but not those bands who are not really known by a big audience. So I was thinking, hey, you don't have to give me music that I can hear on the radio, I want something else. So I started to look into it and apparently Spotify they have an API, so it's like a programmable interface you can connect to their database and then you can ask questions to this database. So I'm using Python, which is like a programmable interface. You can connect to their database and then you can ask questions to this database. So I'm using python, which is like a programming language, to do that. With that python script I can ask the spotify database, the new releases of this week, let's say, or from a certain period, and so what I did?
Speaker 2:I have like a master list of artists that I like, and all the time I had new artists. So, for example, if a certain record label launches a new artist, even if the first track is not good, or I don't like the first track, it doesn't mean that it's not a good artist. So you never know. So if I like the label, then I take the name of the artist and put it to my master list and then my script will look every week to see if this artist and all the other ones, of course, if they released new tracks. And if that's the case, then all these tracks are added to a new playlist and I can listen to that.
Speaker 2:Of course there are limits. Sometimes it's too much to listen. I haven't found a way yet because I see the master list is growing and the amount of releases is also growing, so there will be like a limit. If I'm at 4,000, I think I can't listen to all these tracks anymore. So I have to find a way how to cope with that. But it works pretty well. It gives me like new music that have no streams, like less than thousand streams, but still good music, and then I put this music in my sets sometime yeah because it's not because it's they don't have the right marketing skills or the promotion tools.
Speaker 2:That are not good artists, so. So why not playing them?
Speaker 1:if it's good, it's good yeah, your passion is evident for music. What do you love about music?
Speaker 2:I think it's about emotion. I like a lot of genres. It's not just like techno or house or melodic house or afro. You know, yeah, I can go to like a rock concert and like the music too. It's. It depends on the yeah, the atmosphere, the setting. So music is emotion. I went to lille in france. There was a, an artist, so electronic artist, ron he's called, and he did a show together with a philharmonic orchestra. It was incredible. So, yeah, it was like a Philharmonic Orchestra, but all of a sudden in a club atmosphere with lightning and lasers and yeah. So it's really about the emotion that the music brings. Yeah, I'm often touched by that. Sometimes I can get really excited about music.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and who is on your master list. I'm dying to know what kind of artists do we see on there?
Speaker 2:again. I can take my list here, because there's a few thousands, uh, so uh can you tell us your top five? Just gonna take a little look, but what I already know it's like here it is. So what's definitely on my top five is bicep, because these guys, yeah, they combine good music with good show lights. It's all very, very special.
Speaker 1:They're incredible.
Speaker 2:That's definitely a group. I'm just scrolling through the list now. It's impossible to have a top five. But, for example, you know Stefan Botzin. He's taking you on a journey. It's like he's playing live, so it's not just DJing, he's really bringing his instruments, like synthesizer, and everything with him. He's creating a journey during his sets. It's amazing. It's really a good one too, although they're very popular today, kind of music.
Speaker 2:Um, I've seen them now I think five times, and the atmosphere that they create it's like love and peace and their logo is also the symbol of peace. It's always working. There's lots of happiness during their sets and, uh, I saw, I saw them this year. The opening at Ibiza, in Pasha, was like six hours Fantastic, and I saw them. The closing was in Hai, which is a different club, a little bit newer compared to Pasha, but kind of music in Hai was also very good. So they have like something magic to create a certain atmosphere that you feel the happiness around and, yeah, that's very nice. So I just took three of them. Now it's not just one type of music, it's about what emotions they bring.
Speaker 1:I totally agree. I love nothing more than when you hear a song and it gives you goosebumps.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's it, yeah. And sometimes because I'm producing myself, when I'm creating something, and then all of a sudden, oh yeah, this's it. Yeah. And sometimes because I'm, yeah, producing myself, when I'm creating something, and then all of a sudden, oh yeah, this is it, then I'm so happy, you know. And then the day after you think, oh, it's not that good. But yeah, the moment you discover because it's all about discovery making music is like searching hours, listening to instruments and tweaking these instruments and all of a sudden you think you have something and then you do something with it and you're very happy and then, okay, then the day after, it's about continuous improvement. So I'm playing with Ableton Live already over 10 years now, so I haven't released anything yet. Now it's coming.
Speaker 2:But it took me a long time to uh, to find, yeah, everything. And this, again, it's like software and learning the software. It's like a cockpit of of a plane, so many buttons to push. This is complicated, yeah, but that's the journey. That's what I like learning new things again, and it never stops. I I'm now. I started, for example, in september as a lecturer, artificial intelligence at the university here in antwerp. I love that so much like explaining to these students they are between 21 23 years old explaining what ai will do with their life in the future. And, yeah, how, how it works. Now, just a few weeks ago, I created my own clone digital twin of myself. So now I can type texts and all of a sudden it's me creating video, but that video isn't never recorded by myself. It's that you see me talking and you see me, you hear me speaking, but it's not me. It's crazy. That's, yeah, new, new things all the time.
Speaker 1:It's a really interesting topic because AI is so topical right now. There's more and more tools that are being released constantly that are making life easier, but also that comes with resistance, and some people are quite scared by the development in technology. Do you have anything to say to reassure people, or to give them hope for the positives and what's possible? Or, if they need a warning, you can give them a warning either. It's up to you. What do you want to say?
Speaker 2:First thing, I think, embrace it. It's not going to go away. So look at it, try to discover what it's doing. And, of course, course, we all have to be critical. For example, in music, there is a problem now because more and more ai tracks arrive at spotify and then, of course, also apple music and everywhere, and these tracks are never, never produced by uh, by human beings. It's just an ai tool that creates the music and then they upload these tracks in the hope that it's picked up by people, because it's just, yeah, money. So I think that's not a good evolution. The real creativity will not come from AI. So you can use it to inspire you. I'm using that a lot and that helps. So it gives me ideas. But the new idea is not in the AI, because the AI is trained with everything that already exists, so something that is not existing anywhere in the world, it cannot be created by AI. That's what I think. Even they speak about super intelligence, which means that AI will be smarter than human beings. Well, they will not take over the world, because if we pull the power plug, then the AI is gone, you know. So there is no risk there.
Speaker 2:Don't be afraid. Just embrace it. Use it for what you can. Yeah, if it's helpful, and be careful too, because it's not at all good for the environment. People don't know that and it's a big problem. Example if you do a search on google compared to a search on chat gpt, the google search is one-tenth of power use compared to the chat gpt search. So if you're just looking for something easy, yeah, use Google and not open AI. Yeah, just use it when it's really helpful. And if you can do it with search, take search. It's important. If everybody thinks about it and sees, yeah, what we can do, then it could be a difference.
Speaker 1:I think yeah, it's a good warning that if we all take little actions like that, it will have less of a drain of power. That's good advice. Thank you so much for that. You touched on something that I was actually going to ask you about, and that was inspiration. What made you decide to start producing, and where do you get your ideas and inspiration from?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's 10 years ago, so I don't know exactly what was like. The main driver, the first steps was like GarageBand from Apple. It was just on my computer or on my phone or I don't know where. So I played a bit with it and I thought, oh, so I can just with my computer keyboard I can play the guitar. That's nice. So, because I don't know nothing about notes, you know. So I'm not a musician. So all of a sudden you can create something that sounds good without knowing anything about music. So, no, no, like a theoretical background.
Speaker 2:So I thought, okay, this is interesting, and then I started looking for a better software to do more things. Uh, so I ended up with Ableton and then it became like a bit quiet, because I have so many things that I'm interested in. I also have a business and you cannot. I need like three lives and I only have one life. So or I need like more hours in a day and it's not possible to have more hours in a day, so you have to make decisions and choose.
Speaker 2:So I focused more on my business past couple years and then a few years ago, with the backpack and everything, I really the love of the for the music and the djing was really back and I thought, okay, I have to do something with this. And then I thought, okay, I'm a, I'm a branding consultant, strategy consultant. So I thought, okay, how can I make the difference as a dj, that's, if you're also a producer? So I was really thinking about that and I like music, and if you listen to thousands of tracks every week or every month, let's say, and then you play these tracks and people are enthusiasts, you know that you have like a good ear. If you have a good ear for others music, then maybe you also have a good ear for your own music. So that was what I was thinking.
Speaker 2:But being a perfectionist is not easy to end up with something that you really like. It's like seeing yourself on camera. That's also weird, you know. So it's the same with that, with music. But now the learning curve was pretty steep. I I'm now somewhere that I think, okay, I can do something with it. So here we are for the next step.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yes, what is the next step?
Speaker 2:it's releasing. Yeah, the releasing is um again, it's not easy. It's easy. You can just like you have like a publishing services online. You just upload your track, you, you pay I don't know what is it like 40 euros or something like not a lot of money and then they publish it for you to all the streaming services and then you're done. But if you do that, nobody will ever listen because they don't know that the track exists. So you have to do your promo. That's the next step.
Speaker 2:Now I'm thinking about connecting. Connecting, reaching out to labels and talking to them and see what they need and, if there's something in common, if they like the music, if they want to release it. And then that's what I'm working now on and I think that in the very near future I will be able to release on an existing label. So the track that I sent you is now. There's one label who already said they're interested.
Speaker 2:Okay, between being interested and really releasing, there are still some hurdles to take, but I think that will be the next step and then, once I'm there, then I will continue. And the most difficult thing there is then the style, because I like a lot of types of music, a lot of genres. It's like also when I'm creating. It depends on my mood. Sometimes I'm more in a slower type of music and sometimes it's like a very fast BPM techno. And, yeah, I have the impression that an artist that they make a decision on what type of shot they take and then they stick with it. So I don't know yet. So that's still something that I have to figure out.
Speaker 1:It takes exploration and it takes playing around and figuring out. You're right, some people do kind of. Sometimes they stick with something that's been successful in the past. But then there are other artists who really experiment and jump through different genres. You can see them grow and it takes the listener along on that journey, which is really interesting oh, that, yeah, that's what I like, because that's I understand.
Speaker 2:It's really impossible like always doing the same. No, no, I want to explore new things. It's the same with music. So if I have the possibility to create like something else but it will always have my own style, but in different ways, I think yeah.
Speaker 1:For anybody who would like to start and to pursue what they want to do. Do you have any advice for them?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. The first advice is, of course, just do it. If you have a dream, go for the dream. And I think it's important, especially for younger people. I see lots of young people who are under pressure. They see things on social media that they have to do this and that to become successful, to make money, and so on and so on. But sometimes it's not about making money, it's pursuing your dreams, and go for what you really like, and then the rest will follow, and that's very important.
Speaker 2:So you don't need a whole plan. If you have step one of the plan, it's okay, and then the rest you'll see. We don't have like the crystal ball, you don't have that. So just if you know what you want now with step one, even if people are saying, oh no, you're not, don't do that, don't know, just do it, and then you will see. Because and I can say it for myself in life I did not do that. I went to university, then I started working, career, making children, house and everything, and all of a sudden you have like so much responsibility that freestyling in your dreams is not possible anymore. So you really have to stick on that plan, and that's more the boring plan, you know. So be careful, especially if you're young and you don't have all these responsibilities. Yeah, follow your dreams. I think that's really important.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. And what if there's somebody listening who's in a similar position and they feel that they have this dream but they've got all the responsibilities? What would you say to them to encourage them?
Speaker 2:Well, it's never too late. I can prove that myself. The most important thing is that you question yourself what makes you happy? And then if you see, like, what makes you happy, and then you also, of course, you see what's not making you happy, and then you have to put everything in balance. And, of course, happiness is very important because it keeps you going, and so if you see things that makes you happy, then you really have to do something with that.
Speaker 2:For example, what I do every year I look at the year like an evaluation of my myself at the end of the year around christmas, and then I look okay, what was good last year, what was not so good? Are the things that made my life complex? Can I drop complexity? Do I have options there? And then sometimes you have to make hard decisions of not doing things anymore because it sucks energy and it's not giving energy. But that's an evaluation that you have to do and then all of a sudden, you free up energy and you can do new things with that. So I think it's never too late. Follow the dreams and drop all the negative things. That's what I would suggest, yeah.
Speaker 1:That is excellent advice and a lovely way for us to almost come to the end of this fantastic conversation. Before I let you go, can you please tell us where we can find you on Instagram when your music comes out, where people will be able to hear it? And for now, where can people go and see that incredible YouTube channel? You were telling us about all of your amazing shots.
Speaker 2:Yes, so it's DJ Anverso. Everywhere on YouTube, on Instagram, it's DJAnversocom. Pick one of these, then normally you should's djanversocom. Pick one of these, then normally you should be able to find me.
Speaker 1:Perfect. I will add the link into this description, so everybody listening please go and check Anverso out. This has been such a lovely conversation and I knew when I met you I was really impressed because we met at a networking event that I was an imposter in.
Speaker 2:I remember that yeah.
Speaker 1:I shouldn't have been in that room. This was during Amsterdam Dance Event, ade. I went to the event because I didn't really know what it was and it was for producers, and I was like, oh, I'm not supposed to be here, I'm not a producer. So I very quickly left. But you had heard me say to an A&R oh, I'm not meant to be in this room, I'm leaving. Thank you for speaking to me at ADE. I was so glad that I did and I got to listen to your track and get to hear more about you. So thank you for having a chat with me today.
Speaker 2:Yeah, anytime, it's a wonderful meeting up with you. Thanks for having me here in your podcast.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm delighted. So everybody, please go and check Anverso out. You can find all of his links in the description of this episode and that's it for today. Bye, there you have it. Thank you so much for tuning into this episode of this Is Disruption. If you've enjoyed today's conversation, make sure to follow the podcast and never miss an episode. You can find us on all major podcast platforms Apple Podcasts, spotify, etc. Stay connected with us on social media. You can find the podcast at thisisdisruptionpod on Instagram and TikTok and you will find updates and snippets of upcoming shows. Until next time, keep challenging the status quo, embracing your creative spirit, and be brave. Go and create. Thank you, and see you in the next episode.