Satellite Voices

Shanghai

Introducing Ceezy

June 29, 2011

The young Shanghai producer and DJ and part of the infamous local Otakrew collaborative

• Text by Satellite Voices

Guest Feature by Sam Gaskin

Ceezy, 23, is one of a new breed of talented Shanghai producer/ DJs. He's part of the local Otakrew collaborative, whose Shanghai parties have kicked up a storm despite their aversion to the outside world - the crew's name plays on the Japanese word "otaku", which describes internet-loving shut-ins.

Ceezy himself says that he's not interested in making people dance. "I prefer to produce at home than DJ. It’s really chill. I hate the world outside. I don’t care if people on a dance floor dance or not," he says. 

From his home Ceezy has attracted more than 15,000 fans on Douban, a sort of Chinese MySpace, for his eclectic sample-heavy music. Though Ceezy has been part of Shanghai hip hop / trip hop outfit Beat Conductorz, he says: "I prefer jazz, soul or funk music, even big band and swing. The sort of music I make used to be commercial in the ’80s."

Ceezy grew up in a traditional lane in a Shanghai suburb and got into music by mistake. "When I was seven I heard this West Coast rap, Ice Cube and his little brothers called Da Lench Mob. My father didn’t know what it was when he bought it. He bought Mozart, Beethoven and that," he says.

But though his first love was Western rap and hip hop, he says that Chinese MCs still aren't able to be honest with their lyrics. "I'd rather take things from different eras," he says. "Like there are things from the 1940s in my music; it was a more romantic time. Right now, people are cold. Coldness is a kind of crime."