DJ Sonique

Sooraj Rao aka DJ Sonique first got into dance music when his friends dragged him along to a party in the outskirts of Bombay at the tender age of 13. The experience inspired him to start DJing and he’s been mixing ever since, initially playing commercial house music then DJing psy trance after going to Goa for the first time when he was 16 in 2004.Now based in London and having hit 21 a few weeks ago, he’s been playing psy trance for the last five years and cites Infected Mushroom, Astrix and the Chemical Brothers as his main influences. His style is full-on psy trance, with a lot of cross-over with commercial club trance and techno.A year ago Sooraj started getting into music production. Having played keyboards since he was a kid, he’s quickly got his groove back. Taking a break for the time being while he gets his home studio set up, one project he’s looking forward to working on is his reworking of The Lord of the Rings theme-tune — bound to get some interesting reactions on the dancefloor!To date Sooraj’s favourite gig has been in Goa at a party on the beach. It went for over 24 hours and people were dancing in the same spot for over eight hours! Needless to say he’s always excited about heading home to play in Goa, believing that the fact so many people play purely for the love of it makes it so special.In 2007 Sooraj started playing for Trance Orient Express in Amsterdam and he’s really looking forward to going back there on 30 April. In 2007 he also headlined Psychedelic Spanking, a gig put on by the Nottingham Students Union, as well as being deeply involved in promoting for organisations like Antiworld, Roots, Psycle and Mayfair Parties.In 2008 Sooraj played at parties all over Europe including Amsterdam, Sweden, Ibiza, London, etc alongside live acts such as Infected Mushroom, Astrix, Talamasca, Delirious, Psycraft, Atomic Pulse and Timelock to name a few.Sooraj’s music started as a hobby, as he came to London to finish his degree in business administration. However now it’s become far more than that and he’s keen to get playing at more events and producing. With this winning combination of DJing, music production and promotion and age on his side, Sooraj has a very promising future indeed.Quote from Enrico of Antiworld: “Sooraj is a very hard working member of the Antiworld team. He has a passion for psy trance and has seen the biggest names at work. I think he’s now finding his own path and having played at the We Love Astrix 001 afterparty at Hidden, I’m sure he’s set to become another blinding Antiworld resident DJ.”