From underground to mountain top

Vancouver girl group takes to the mountains for Snowbombing

Throughout university Allison Wood, better known as Vancouver-based DJ AWood, started going to more and more music festivals including larger events such as Coachella, Ultra and Shambhala. Finding herself drawn to the electronic music performances, she thought if she loved it so much why not try and do it herself?

“I just disregarded any self-doubt, went out and bought a little DJ set up for myself to practise and from there it just really grew,” she explained.

Nearly five years later she is a member of a “girl gang” of DJs known as Femme Fatale, a group of three female-identifying DJs who perform both together and separately. Currently the trio is preparing to perform at Snowbombing Canada. The festival will be AWood’s largest event performance to date.

“I think we have a few hours set and we’ll probably read the vibes of the mountain and tradeoff and all play together which is called back to back or b2b DJing,” said Wood.

Explaining her personal style as strictly house music she said her fellow DJ’s MYNXY who has a heavier bass music style and INNEZZ who seamlessly mixes techno, disco and bass music in a way that will always keep you guessing.

While many DJ’s like to plan their sets out beforehand, Wood said she feels confined doing that and has planned to bring her favourite songs and a few of her own creations to debut at this year’s event.

“That gives me more freedom to be creative and also relieves my stress because I know I can take it any direction it needs to go.”

Having created her first EP last year, the event will be one of the first times she debuts her own songs. She said it’s nerve wracking to play them because it feels like a big deal each time, despite the crowd not knowing they’re her originals.

“I’m definitely going to put those tracks that I made in my playlist, and hopefully there will be a right moment to let them out,” she said. “The tracks I made, they are house they’ve got a pretty strong baseline, sort of minimal. If anyone’s familiar with Kyle Watson, it’s very much Kyle Watson-y.”

With DJing being a more solo industry she said it’s nice to have a group to go to performances   with rather than travelling alone.

“It’s really cool because all of us are pretty versatile so we don’t only play every show ourselves, we also invite other DJs that fit with us from around Vancouver to play. We feel it’s not just our tight group but we’ve built a community around it.”

This year’s Snowbombing lineup features many Vancouver-based performers, many of which are female-identifying DJs.

“They’re not even seeing it as male and female, they’re just booking the best talent which just so happens to a lot of the time be women,” said Wood.

Wood and Femme Fatale will perform Sunday, April 7, starting off at the Sunburst at noon and then again at the Cariboo Club at eight pm. Canada returns to Sun Peaks April 5 to 7 with festival headliners Illenium and Cypress Hill.