Sneak peak: Sam Divine

Sam Divine is a force to be reckoned with. She’s gone from Weston-Super-Mare to the beaches of Ibiza, all the while racking up hundreds of thousands of views on YouTube and across all her socials.

Her roots are in the west country, where she used a pair of belt drive turntables and a battered Numark to construct a homemade mixer set up in her Mum’s shed. As a teen, Divine hosted a pirate radio show from her bedroom using ‘borrowed’ equipment from the local college, and time spent expanding her musical knowledge working at Spin Central in her hometown of Weston-Super-Mare and Chemical Records in Bristol.

Since then, she’s been pretty prolific. She moved to London, graduating from Weston-Super-Mare to a record shop in Notting Hill. There, she ended up meeting DJs and A&R types, and started booking nights in clubs across the capital – including starting her own, La Vita, an all-female night for breast cancer awareness.

Sam Divine is a household name – literally. Her unadulterated house sets are subtle and show real mastery of the genre. She’s proved it time and time again, at clubs all over the world. She’s played at some of the island’s biggest clubs year upon year, holding down residencies at Pacha, Mambo, Amnesia, Eden and Ushuaïa, and featured on line-ups with some of the greatest names in dance including Frankie Knuckles, Master’s At Work, MK, DJ Spen, KiNK, Sandy Rivera and The Shapeshifters. Sam launched her own highly successful imprint, DVINE Sounds, in 2015. To date, the label has seen 58 releases, helping to propel talented up and coming artists into the spotlight.

Career success has come thick and fast for Divine over the last few years – it’s difficult to know where to begin. 2019 saw her debut appearance at London’s famous Printworks venue, where she returned on New Year’s Day alongside her Defected crew. In September she was invited by Radio 1 tastemaker Pete Tong to record a coveted Essential Mix – a true marker of how far her career has come. 2019 also marked Divine’s first Mixmag Lab NYC set. All this on top of touring globally, playing 21 festivals worldwide, an epic gig at the top of London’s iconic Tower Bridge and raising over £40,000 for Breast Cancer Research through her charity D-Vita. She’s been crazy busy.

We’re going to be speaking to her next week about everything – addressing the elephant in the room *ahem* covid - and really digging deep down into her creative process. In the meantime, you should really check her out. Catch her latest We Dance As One NYE set live from the Defected HQ here. And, of course, follow her on Instagram.

(Credit: @BBC) 

Words by Rebecca Clayton

 

Cover photo courtesy of @upfrontbeats