We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Nina Vicious. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Nina below.
Nina, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Earning a full time living from one’s creative career can be incredibly difficult. Have you been able to do so and if so, can you share some of the key parts of your journey and any important advice or lessons that might help creatives who haven’t been able to yet?
My journey into creative freelancing was sort of always bound to happen. I’ve always been a musician, however I didn’t have the courage to pursue it full time until I was in my early 30s and by that point, as you can imagine, the majority of my experience was in 9 to 5 work. I had absolutely no understanding of the ins and outs of what makes a creative freelancer successful. I had my talent and a dream and so at some point decided to take the plunge. Over the years my impulsivity would prove to be a blessing and a curse. In truth, if I had known then what I know now about how rigorous creative freelancing actually is I may not have had the courage to ever shift gears; but then I would never have gotten to experience the many highs I’ve had the joy of experiencing as a DJ.
By the time I started my full time DJ career I had 8 years of teaching elementary school and about 5 years of clerical experience under my belt. I was an academically trained musician but had never had any experience pursuing it as a career. Ultimately during my career in education I became nostalgic for my time as a musician and decided to take a DJ class for fun. What started out as fun became an obsession. It opened up a new and exciting world to me, introduced me to a new community of music lovers and I also just so happened to be good at it! Not surprisingly, I soon became excited at the prospect of monetizing my new hobby. And so one day I simply walked into my day job, quit and that was the start of my life as a creative freelancer.
I came into creative freelancing having made a little bit of a name for myself locally amongst industry professionals in the DJ community but I had no nest egg, no experience in marketing or promotion and no real residencies anywhere. I was very much so relying on my talent alone to pay the bills. I soon realized that attaining a loyal roster of clients would take a lot more patience and some huge investments that I now no longer had any income to fund because, as previously mentioned, I had just hastily quit my job in my excitement to step into this new creative phase of life.
In the first 5-6 years of my DJ career I struggled to financially supplement the few gigs that were mostly passed on to me by more established DJ’s in the industry. I took on side jobs as a technical writer, record store clerk, DJ 101 instructor and other side jobs to help pay the bills. And I will say, in all earnest, that sometimes the bills got paid and sometimes they didn’t. There were some truly tough times but as the years went on I organically learned skills that made me a more professional, organized and strategic freelancer. I became better at budgeting and understanding that having to take on an odd job during a month when gigs are slow doesn’t make me a failure at my craft, it just means my income will be earned in some other way that month. In this regard I am thankful for my background in other careers because it afforded me a variety of skills that I can apply to many different roles. This helps during months when I’m not as heavily booked as others. It happens.
Aside from becoming a better budgeter I also developed skills in social media marketing, website management, graphic design and live streaming. Livestreaming became especially important for all DJs to learn during the pandemic when NYC nightlife shut down and we all temporarily lost our jobs. I can attest that it was a painstaking and frustrating but ultimately rewarding process as it created a new audience for me and opened up an additional stream of income. Last, but not least, I learned how to create genuine and lasting relationships in my community by keeping people with similar creative goals close and by putting my best foot forward when offers come my way to show that I value my work and I value my clients. This creates a level of trust that leads to lasting partnerships, which hopefully leads to steady income.
In retrospect, I would have benefited from having more education on a variety of aspects of my job before diving in head first. It would have been helpful to have taken some sort of financial health course that was catered to freelancers. I would likely have also benefited from saving up enough money to fund all of the investments I had to make before quitting my day job. DJ equipment, wardrobe and promo materials alone set me back a pretty penny to begin with.
Since nightlife has reopened I have had the honor of mostly being regularly booked. However I’ve also taken on a position as social media manager and administrator for an organization called Outsmart NYC. Outsmart NYC is an organization that aims to make nightlife spaces safer by offering free bystander intervention trainings to NYC nightlife venues and working with them has been a wonderful experience where I have been able to help my nightlife community in a way that I truly find fulfilling but which has also served to help supplement my income when creative work is sparse. It took me a very long time to find the right balance as a creative freelancer and I’ve experienced my fair share of lows, but ultimately I love the work that I do and I am so happy to be able to still do it on a regular basis… a little more responsibly than before.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
My name is Nina Vicious and I’m a full-time DJ born, raised and residing in Brooklyn, NY with 10 years of professional DJ experience under my belt. I have been a guest DJ at parties such as Soul In The Horn, Toca Tuesdays, Club Renaissance, Afrolatino Fest, Club Butter Roll and more. My musical roots range from Top 40 to house to future bass but I’m known to sprinkle in my parents cultural influences here and there (Puerto Rico & Haiti respectively). Having obtained a Master’s Degree in Classical Voice, my classical training influences my technical approach to my craft however my favorite aspect of DJ’ing is creating the perfect atmosphere for a variety of crowds. I love how interactive DJ’ing can be and I really enjoy approaching it as service work. When I’m in the booth I’m not so much concerned with how I am being perceived, I am far more interested in how my DJ’ing is impacting the clubgoers overall experience. I love the idea of one of my DJ sets being attached to a night that will live on in a person’s memory forever. Ultimately creating experiences of joy for my clients through music and through my craft is my utmost priority and what I enjoy the most. I can be found exhibiting this at venues across NYC including but not limited to Friends & Lovers BK, Royal Palms Shuffleboard Club, Union Hall, Butcher’s Daughter, Fig 19, Lucky Jacks and more.
We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?
The best advice I can give regarding building an audience on social media is to cater the content to the specific social media platform you’re posting to. Engaging conversations with likeminded folks and informative discussions along with charismatic banter will get you far on Twitter. However on Instagram the focus is far more visual and good quality photos and videos that reflect what you want the person viewing your account to know about your work is the best sort of content for that platform. Hashtags, while old school, still work. They don’t do the heavy lifting however. Ultimately finding your audience comes from posting content that will attract the folks you want to attract and so the best way to post and engage on social media is being your authentic self and presenting your best creative work.
For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?
For me, the most rewarding aspect of being an artist is being able to live life on my terms. I’m being my most authentic self, living in my truth and doing something I truly love doing. In my opinion the work I do also provides a very necessary service by providing people an escape through music. It’s truly rewarding to watch people vibing and enjoying themselves.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.ninavicious.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nina_vicious/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/nina_vicious
- Other: Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/ninavicious
Image Credits
Nina Vicious