Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Rain Vanhecke. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Hi Rain, thanks for joining us today. Did you always know you wanted to pursue a creative or artistic career? When did you first know?
When I started DJing in 1998, it gave me my first taste of what I really enjoyed was controlling the energy of the dance floor. I found it a very interesting experience, the music a DJ plays can uplift a party or dance. Or the music a DJ plays can make everyone leave and not have any fun. This really appeals to me, I love to help others, to me being a DJ makes me feel like If I do a good enough job I’m uplifting and bringing people together giving positive energy to the dance floor. There is something beautiful when people are dancing and moving together, it’s a love and energy that really can’t be duplicated. It’s a group energy experience that is beautiful to be a part of but also is like welding magic to the crowd. Take people away from their troubles by taking them to a place where they can just lose themselves in the dance and for that moment they are free from the outside world. It was then that DJing spoke to me and the music spoke to me, it was then I knew that I wanted to not just play the music I wanted to make it as well. This was a path laid before me, and I knew in my heart I was in the right place; I wanted to create and play the music that made wielding the magic of positive energy to the dance floor.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
I’m a first generation American, my family is from Belgium. My family my grandpapa, grandmama, my mom and my aunt moved to Canada in 1954 from Belgium on a bet my grandpapa made with his brother. After a few years in Montreal, my family moved to Southern California Los Angeles area. I was born and raised in a suburb of Los Angeles, where my parents were music fans always playing The Beetles, going on long trips in the family car, we always listened to lot of music. This gave me an affection for music and loving it, I was a kid of the 80s. I had MTV and VH1 music videos. It was a huge thing, so music was always in my life. After high school I was always the person in my group who had all the music. I had many CD Cases the size of phone books full of albums, I was always asked to bring my CDs to the parties being I had the biggest library.
In 1996, I became a sound engineer for a biker blues band called The Rogues. How I got into this was when I went to church with my mom, I was agnostic, but my mom wanted me to go with her. While at the church just watching the live church band and me being an observant tech person and into computers, video games, and music. I saw the person who ran the sound console (Mixer) at the back of the church controlling the audio of the band, I stood next to the area and watched as I found it cool and fascinating. A few Sundays go by and while I was watching I was asked by the sound engineer if I was interested in learning how to use it. I of course said yes, a few months later I was helping to run the audio for the band at the church. He showed me a lot of the operations of the audio, microphones, recording, setting up microphones and a lot more. One month the normal sound engineer took a month off, he asked me to run the sound for the church by myself for the month. One Sunday I was doing my normal thing of running the audio. A gentleman came up to me and said he really liked the band’s audio mix and that I had a great ear for the audio. I was just mixing the music how I thought it sounded good, making sure the vocals are clear and that you can hear every instrument but not overpowering everything, making sure the singers can be heard so they sounded clear and natural. The gentlemen told me I was a natural and asked if I had previous experience of training. I told him no I didn’t have any experience, just the few months experience from helping the church engineer. He then told me he was a live sound engineer and drummer for his band The Rouges. He asked me if I would be interested in being their sound engineer as it would be easier for him to just play drums and not worry about mixing. I of course jumped on the opportunity and took it. It gave me the opportunity and experience I thought would be cool to learn.
After a few years in 1998 I got a job at a Guitar Center in the Pro Audio DJ section of the store. It’s after speaking to many people in the music industry that piqued my interest into wanting to be a part of the music scene. After attending numerous Pro Audio and DJ classes from manufacturers on the equipment, talking to many DJs, I realized it was a cool profession. Me being a live sound engineer for now 2 years I was asked by a DJ who had his own gear to come along to his gigs to help set up his equipment properly. Setting up audio equipment was much more involved task and could be complicated in 1998 than it is now. So, I being the live sound engineer and a person who loves to help others I went along. While doing lots of different gigs with him he shows me how to DJ, he was a house DJ. So I started on Technics 1200 Turntables spinning vinyl, this got me into DJing and EDM. Afterwards that was it I hooked, I knew this was something I wanted to. I was good at it; it involved tech knowledge of the equipment and music knowledge as again the person who had a big library of music already appealed to me. What really grabbed me is observing the DJ, the DJ of the party controls the energy of the dance floor/party. If the DJ is good the energy is up and everyone is having fun dancing, but if the DJ doesn’t do a good job or plays to their audience you lose that energy, people leave the dance floor and or leave the party. Having this kind of control over energy was again very appealing and it solidified this is what I want to do. In 2003, I created 3 original EDM music tracks, I felt in my heart that I wanted more control of the dance floor energy by becoming a producer. I wanted to make the music that people dance to that brings the energy to the dance floor or party. After all this I knew this where I belonged was in music and creating, but this genre of music (EDM) was still on the new side and very new it was appealing. It was a step in a different direction than the classic instrument type band music, it was exciting to be part of something new, creating something new and unique I found spoke to me. I now have a home studio setup and I am working on creating music again.
I love to play music for the love of the music, I don’t do it for fame, I just enjoy bringing positive energy. My life has always been steered into entertainment in some form, from 2007-2009, I worked in the video game industry with companies like EA, Activision, and Pandemic Studios, contributing to audio design team for immersive gaming experiences. Since relocating to Vancouver WA in 2019, I’ve resumed my DJ career, performing at various clubs, events, and conventions, including venues like Capacity Social, White Owl, WonderLuv, Tube PDX, Luna Bar, Sanctuary PDX, Plush Vancouver, Secret Roller Disco, Mt.Tabor Dance and RollerCon in Las Vegas and more.
I specialize in genres like Drum n Bass, Bass/Tech House, Deep Tech/Minimal, Nu-Disco/Funky/Jacking House, Deep House, Hip/G House, Progressive House & Trance. I’m a resident DJ for various Portland and Vancouver venues, I also DJ weddings, high school dances, and proms, and I own a full mobile DJ setup with sound, lighting, and lasers.
In addition to DJing, I’m a jammer for Crow City Roller Derby, Prop and Uniform Coordinator/Team Medic for the Portland Ghostbusters, Same Wave Radio Host of my own show it’s called Purple Jamz, and I’m a co-host the Ghost Heads Nerd Talk Podcast that airs live every Monday on YouTube and Spotify.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
In the early to mid-00’s I experienced a lot of bad luck that took my life into an uncertain spin. I experienced so much bad luck that I didn’t know what to do with myself. I tried to go to college getting in and taking courses but could never finish because I couldn’t afford it, I worked a lot of different jobs in many many fields never finding what I felt was what I wanted to do. I drifted a lot, rudderless, in despair, I’ve been homeless, had my cars repossessed, my life and stuff taken away I lost hope. Bills and rent made me sell my music equipment. I was very depressed and in a lot of despair. It felt like my life wasn’t worth it at the time, I was constantly experiencing bad luck everywhere I went, I felt cursed. I’m a 2-time suicide survivor, I tried to end my life as I felt life didn’t feel it was worth anything i just was lost in a major tailspin. Through it all music is something I really wanted to do, but creating music is expensive and as a very low to no income person I didn’t have a way to get back into it. But 2 failed attempts it appears life was keeping me here, though at the same time I didn’t know why, I drifted barely making enough. Though I had all but given up I just kept going, I knew I couldn’t check out life wouldn’t let me, so I just stopped resisting and kept moving forward it was all I could do.
Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?
The goal is to bring happiness to everyone, with all music it’s something universally enjoyed that brings happiness to everyone on this planet. As a person who has experienced so much darkness, bad luck, pain, loss, loss of my home, loss of my friends, loss of my family. I want to bring happiness to everyone I can as I don’t want them to experience what I went through. There is a quote by Robin Williams I believe is true “I think the saddest people always try their hardest to make people happy because they know what it’s like to feel absolutely worthless and they don’t want anyone else to feel like that.” That is what keeps me going
Contact Info:
- Website: https://djpurplerain.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rainvanhecke_purplerain/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rainvanhecke
- Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/purplerain_76
Image Credits
New Wave Studio- George Padilla- Main Picture