Tijana T talks politics, raves, and her path to becoming Serbia’s foremost DJ

Earlier this month, San Francisco was lucky enough to hold Tijana T with the As You Like It crew for one night. Tijana’s been in the game for over a decade now, and she’s done pretty much everything you could do in the industry. She grew up during the formation of Serbia’s rave scene amid sociopolitical conflict in the late 90s. Since then, she’s been a radio and TV presenter for the legendary B92, had residencies at the most important clubs in Serbia, and played at leading shows and festivals across the globe. I met up with the Belgrade boss at the BAMPFA to have a little chat before the party.

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Tijana, thank you so much for meeting with the B-Side. Most of the interviews we do are with Bay Area locals, but now we have a Serbian DJ in the mix!

It doesn’t happen very often! There aren’t too many Serbian DJs traveling so wherever in the world you are, student or not, it’s hard to find a Serbian playing.

So you’re the only Serbian on Resident Advisor’s Top 1000 listed DJs! Generally, eastern European DJs don’t get the same kind of coverage as their western counterparts. Do you find that the scenes out there are more isolated?

I think it’s important to realize that many Eastern European countries are completely different to each other — politically they’re treated differently. It’s much harder to move out of Serbia or to even exchange with the rest of Europe than it is for Romanians because of the European Union. The Romanian passport allows you to travel, work, and live easily in Europe whereas, say, Ukrainians need visas to go anywhere. Serbians don’t need visas just to travel around Europe but we do need resident permits to work, and they’re not easy to get. So yes, some of these territories are isolated — some more than others. Of course, it’s not what people want it’s just the way it is.

Have you faced problems with any of these barriers?

I’ve faced a lot of complications with my Serbian passport in the last two years. Even though the country is freer than it used to be in the 90s, our visa status is unclear. I feel that we’re not welcome in quite a few countries and I face a lot of discrimination at the borders just based on the passport that I hold.

Going back to the first question, Eastern European countries each have independent scenes. I have to say most of these countries have far more interesting and mature dance music scenes than a lot of Western European countries. I’m just sorry that the rest of the world can’t be exposed to it.

There’s a Western tendency that I even fell into with the first question, which homogenizes these scenes — but I imagine they must all be so different.

Yeah, I’d say that Ukraine and Romania are similar — Minimal House and Minimal Techno are very big in both countries, and they do influence each other. However, this music isn’t big in Serbia at all. Guys like Raresh [Raresh Rush] probably wouldn’t sell a lot of tickets in Belgrade. The Serbian scene has always been more musically dynamic — more warehouse techno sounds, more funky techno or just classic house with more melody.

It all goes back to politics; these countries have different historical paths. Serbia used to be part of Yugoslavia and Yugoslavia was one of the most progressive countries in the world from the 50s until its break up. It was like a, “liberal communist” country, it was more consumerist and had special status worldwide. The old Serbian passport was the most desirable passport in the world because you could travel freely both to the West and the East. Most other Eastern European countries were under the influence of the USSR. They were closed off, and there was no exchange with the West, so their musical taste was formed in a different way to Serbians.

Did that Western exposure promote a more commercial music taste at the time in Serbia?

Well, actually Belgrade’s general taste in music has always been quite underground. For example, there was a huge new wave synth scene in the 80s. Madonna’s first album [Madonna (1983)] was only distributed in Serbia in 1990 because before that it was considered bad taste.

It was a communist country, and of course, imports were controlled by the government, but it was done so through specialists in their field. I think Depeche Mode is still a bigger band in the whole Yugoslavian territory than Madonna ever was. That’s a good example of what the Yugoslavian, Serbian or Belgrade heritage is and that’s what passes on through generations.

There were the Yugoslav Wars and NATO bombings in the late 90s. What kind of impact did these crises have?  

Even though the war wasn’t directly in the territory of Serbia, we faced all the consequences of war. There were economic crises — unbelievably high inflation and lots of sanctions. There was no food in the supermarkets. I remember my family would eat beans every day for two or three years. I can’t stand beans anymore when I see them, it just reminds me of that period. The average salary was, what would be, around three euros per month. Money in the morning was worth nothing in the afternoon. It was quite an extreme period.

The funny thing is though, it was during this troubled 90s period that the whole techno and rave scene was formed in Serbia. When you can’t really calculate what you’re doing tomorrow and how tomorrow will influence your future, then you’re way more free at parties. People were literally partying as if there was no tomorrow.

I imagine that dance music was a way for many people to find some identity.

Yeah, it was. Society was falling apart at that time. People who were into music, free spirits, intellectuals and the general youth would find their own society within the rave culture.

The NATO bombings affected my generation a lot. I was 18 and was just finishing high school. Everything stopped. We couldn’t go to school, and the shops were closed. The sirens would go off at 8 pm every day; no one was allowed on the street, and the bombing would start. However, it was safe during the day, and there was a club called Industrija that would hold daytime raves. We would literally go raving in the afternoon. That was the first time that really young kids were allowed to go to clubs. You’d see like 14-year-olds, it was bizarre.

So did places like Industrija go on to establish the labels and wider industry in Serbia?

There were no labels! Even now there are only a few labels, but they’re so minor, and they suffer so much. Serbian labels have to prove themselves ten times more than any of their peers around Europe. What you know as a music infrastructure is not something that we had or even have right now. It’s all just a mess, and it’s all very spontaneous.

I see, so people just knew that they enjoyed partying and decided to start their own thing.

Exactly. A lot of the senior DJs were grouped around B92, which is the legendary independent Serbian radio.

And you worked for B92 yourself, right?

Yes, I first worked for B92 on TV and then I had my radio show, but that was in the 2000s.

In the 90s, B92 was fighting against the government, dictatorship and war. In those times there was no commercial pressure because there were no markets and nothing to sell. What mattered to this radio station was the truth that was never told on the National TV. Also musically, it was very creative and very extreme. It was kind of like having Monty Python playing for 24 hours a day. They played like crazy noise, all the stuff that you’d never normally hear on daytime radio, and it was a huge influence to all of us. From B92 there were a few people that would host shows, and they were the main people in the Belgrade scene in the 90s.

There was also a younger generation of DJs. There was one group by the name Teenage Techno Punks. There was three of them, and they were like my age. It was the first time we’d seen teenagers playing techno to teenagers and they were instantly very popular. The young audience could relate to them; it wasn’t like some grumpy 35-year-old guy. They’d play techno, but it wasn’t dry, not minimal, quite funky – there was lots of bass and melody. Marko Nastić [one of the members] was Serbia’s biggest export back then. He’d get featured in Mixmag, DJMag and so on. They found it so interesting that this 19-year-old kid from Serbia seemed to be uniting the whole of ex-Yugoslavia through the power of dance music.

So did these guys inspire you to become a DJ or was it something else?

I had different influences. I had one crazy uncle who I grew up with who was very into music and collecting records. He was always listening to weird industrial noise. So even when I was like five years old, I knew about bands like Can, Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft, and so on. He was a big influence, and that’s why my taste was never commercial.

Your time at B92 must have influenced your taste and style also.

Selecting music for such broad masses definitely influenced my style. I used to play all sorts of music like Disco, House, and Pop. I love mixing pop records with techno records — that’s like my favorite thing to do. People consider me a techno DJ, but that’s not really correct.

B92 hired me because they thought I was a pretty face but I was always playing really bold music. I would play like 10-minute live recordings of Autechre in the middle of the day then follow up with a Justin Timberlake song that I liked. Everyone was a little confused, but it would keep their attention because they’d never know what I was going to play.

I was also singing in choirs and taking singing classes, so I was quite inspired by classical and choral music. I always try to play tracks with a lot of musicality. I think it’s quite rare to find a dry track in one of my sets; it’s always quite rich in sound and harmony.

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More on the singing. Am I right in thinking that you toured with Abe Duque as a singer for a while?

That’s a crazy story. I met Abe when he was playing in Belgrade for the first time, and two of the guys from B92 were hosting the party. They hired me to promote and send out press releases etc. and I was also responsible for taking Abe around for interviews. I remember in one of his interviews he said his new goal was to become the next Quincy Jones and that he’s “looking for his Michael Jackson.”

And there you were?

Well after his interviews he came up to me and asked me to sing with him during his live act. I was excited about the idea but also terrified. I didn’t even know where this idea had come from. He just said: “I can tell you can probably sing.” His wife is an opera singer, so maybe that’s how he could tell from the way I spoke or something.

I didn’t know all of his music, and I definitely didn’t know about his live acts conceptually. But when I came to the party he said: “I’m going on stage now. There’s a spare mic there, so whenever you feel like it, go out and sing. Just improvise, sing whatever you want.” After a couple glasses of champagne, I heard him play this kind of Drum and Bass beat. I used to be a big fan of DnB, and that was my cue. I was on for the last 15 minutes of his set. People went crazy because it was Belgrade and most of the audience either knew me from parties or from TV.

So that was the start of a new chapter in your life?

Well after that, Abe invited me to come to Berlin to record a few tracks with him. As soon as I arrived, he told me that the next morning I was going to Robert Johnson club in Offenbach for Groove magazine’s birthday party. At that time Groove magazine was really influential, and they were doing these birthday parties in several cities around Germany. The lineups were insane. At that particular party, it was Ricardo Villalobos, Luciano — all the biggest names at that time. Again, Abe and I didn’t really rehearse so I basically just improvised. In fact, there was a minor incident when the power plug went on fire, and all the machines stopped. The only thing left was my microphone, so I had to keep this thousand-person audience entertained all on my own for like 5 minutes.

What did you end up doing?!

I sang this old Yugoslavian pop song from the 80s — it’s like a synth-pop acapella thing. Nobody could understand a word I was singing, but these were the only lyrics that came to my mind! The editor of Groove magazine was standing right behind us at that point, but he liked it so much that we got full-page coverage and crazy reviews. After that everyone wanted to book Abe Duque with his new singer!

We traveled together for the next few years and released a few records — all of which were improvisation. We were fairly successful — we played in the biggest festivals around Europe and were voted the best live act of the 2006 season in Ibiza. Eventually, it faded out because Abe had some family issues and wanted to stay in New York.

So was this the moment you turned to DJing?

Actually, at around the same time that I first met Abe, I started a Monday night party in Belgrade with my best friend. We just did it for fun; we played whatever music we liked and couldn’t even mix. The parties were a success, but I was literally learning how to mix in front of full clubs with up to 1000 people. I made so many bad mistakes! That continued for like the next five years because I couldn’t really afford the equipment.

What sort of stuff were you playing at these parties? Is it anything like what you play now?

No, it was quite different. We still played house and techno, but we played electro, minimal and even indie rock — anything you could mix into dance music.

So how did it progress from this Monday night thing to your residencies at the Drugstore and 20/44?

It started with the media situation in Serbia, which was becoming quite commercial. I would have had to make a lot of compromises if had stayed working on TV and Radio. I didn’t want to do that. I wanted to make my shows fun and informative — I was quite protective of the music.

I realized that the DJ thing wasn’t a hobby. I had started doing parties every weekend and people were inviting me all over the place. So I began recording mixes and sending them out. I used social media to present myself as DJ and DJ only. From 2010 until 2015 I started to get established in Belgrade and the rest of Serbia.

There were some dudes, who I had even helped back when I was promoting, who were against me and perceived me as competition. They thought of me as like a “TV girl turned DJ” and would gossip. But clubs in Belgrade like The Tube and 20/44 were extremely supportive. If they hadn’t booked me I wouldn’t be where I am now. The guys at 20/44 and Tube had known me since my rave days, so they knew who I was and took me seriously.

I had hunted for booking agencies for like five years.  I was about to give up. DJing in Serbia doesn’t provide a living. It’s very stressful, hard to get music and equipment, and paid so miserably. But I told myself that I’d go to one more dance event in Amsterdam to do a couple more meetings with booking agents. There I met Dystopian in 2015, and that was when things started to take off internationally.

And now you’re in San Francisco playing tonight with the As You Like crew!

Yes, that’s right!

I’d like the readers to get a taste of what you might play tonight. What are the tunes you’ve got on heaviest rotation at the moment?

There are a bunch of songs; I don’t like picking one or two out. I can say that my style is somewhere between House and Techno. Lately, I’ve started to play more broken beat and electro tunes in my sets because I really enjoy breaking down the 4/4 beat.

I used to love electro, so it’s funny how that has come back. In fact, it’s funny that it’s always the girls that dictate the trends! Now that Helena Hauff is so popular, Electro is coming back. When Nina Kraviz first broke out, she was so into Acid, and then all of a sudden everyone was playing Acid. Before her, it was Heidi who was playing Jackin’ House, and everyone started producing these “Jack Jack” tunes.

I hadn’t thought of that! So what about your set opener? Do you have anything in line or will you just see in the moment?

Right now I have no idea. I usually get an idea when I get to the club. Most of my sets are unplanned, even my Boiler Rooms. I just go there with a bunch of tracks and see.

That makes sense, I guess if you don’t plan your profession why plan your sets?

Yes, that’s true! I pretty much just ride the waves. When I’m in the club, I watch the crowd and see how they react to the previous DJ. I try to think about what my first and last tune will be and somehow knit whatever in between.

I had this ongoing joke with Abe where he’d call me a “Chicken Surfer.” He would say: “You’re so scared of making a decision that you just ride whatever wave comes your way. But you’re not actually brave, you’re a chicken because you can’t make any decision on your own!”

So tonight, when the time’s right, what’s going to be your secret weapon?

There’s this one very Chicago tune called “We Need Our Weave” that was released last year by T-1000 (Alan Oldham) on BPitch Control. It has this crazy vocal — incredibly bouncy and even a bit hysterical. People always go a bit mad to this one. I might mix it in with some Acid and make things a bit crazier.

OK, last one. It’s post-party, lovely Sunday morning, what are you gonna spin to start off your day?

That’s a hard one. It would have to be something really really nice.

It’s not a song, but there’s an album called “Trance – Tapes.” It’s like slow-mo synth recordings from the 80s that were recently rediscovered and compiled. I’m also a big fan of Tangerine Dream, and that’s something I like listening to when I wake up in the morning. I’m a sucker for the classics, so maybe even like Tanita Tikaram’s “Twist In My Sobriety” or Massive Attack’s “Unfinished Sympathy.”

Oh, and if it’s grey weather, there’s nothing like a good Disco song. Even if it’s just Michael Jackson!

Tijana, thank you again for your time. Good luck with the party, I look forward to it.

See you there!

Words and Photos by Ismail Salim