DJ K-Swizz (Kalib Strickland)

“I’m from Auckland, NZ… Canal Rd! My Dad (DJ Reminise) grew up there and my Nana still lives there. 

Growing up in a musical family, I was always surrounded by music. My Dad is a DJ so I was influenced by him. I started off producing, making beats but then I thought I’d give DJing a go because Dad would travel lots for work and get paid to do something he loved. He said “Put your heart into those turntables & you’ll travel the world for free”.

Dad would teach me the basic fundamentals then let me try my own thing and build my own style. I decided I wanted to battle so when I was 9, after only 8 months of practising, I competed in the DMC online competition and placed 8th in the World!

I went to Avondale Primary and Mal Lakatani (Music teacher) approached me about playing a set at an event they were putting on at the old 3 Guys site. I was 9 years old, playing to mates from school and other kids, who seemed to be loving it.

I also went to Avondale College and they were really supportive of all the time I’d needed to take off to travel for competitions, like they never let people use the music studio but they encouraged me by letting me use it during lunch time. We had a cool music teacher (edyonthebeat), who would make beats with us too.

I just got home 2 weeks ago from Paris where I won my 11th World title. I’m the first & youngest DJ to win the ‘DMC World Classic’ title from the Southern hemisphere. 

Now I’m taking a break for the rest of the year and will look at holding seminars, workshops, showcases and run our DJ School (NZ DJ Academy) in 2025 because I want to push Turntablism in NZ. I practise every day and for the last couple of years I’ve been going live on TikTok (and other platforms) so that people can see what I do, but it’s different when you see it happen in real life.”