“You’re always going to have to work harder than everyone else,” is a sentiment that Erfaan Arif was exposed to from a young age. And it’s that same sentiment that many other queer people of colour have had to face throughout their life.
So, when Erfaan announced to the world that he’d started DJing, he knew the road ahead would be a long and arduous one. “It’s difficult for any new DJ to start out and get booked,” he tells Not Safe For Queers. “But for me, I always had this thought in my head that, you know, I’m a brown gay man—going to a queer venue in general is alienating enough. Imagine trying to get someone to pay you to be there.”
To his surprise, however, the queer community in Sydney has welcomed him with open arms. And now seven months later, he’s had the opportunity to play at more than a dozen venues and events, with his own regular slot at Newtown Hotel on Fridays and Saturdays.
The success he’s seen is something he attributes to his unique approach to the craft.
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DJ Erfaan at Universal // Photo: Lachy Spratt
“When you have a certain demographic that DJs all the time, you’ll often hear the really big gay icons (like Lady Gaga, Kim Petras, and Dua Lipa) being played quite often. And that’s great, that’s fine,” he says.
“But I think the beauty of having other demographics DJ is that we tend to play songs that not every person may know. It just brings something different to the table, which I think is so important.”
For Erfaan, that means throwing in some of the tracks that he grew up listening to. “I’ll play songs like Move Ya Body and The Boy Is Mine, but I also make sure I include—without it being too obvious—POC artists in my mixes,” he says. “That’s something I definitely wholeheartedly am mindful about. I just think it’s so important.”
“And without sounding too arrogant, I’ve actually had so many people come up to me and be like, ‘you play music that I’ve never heard at gay clubs.’ Like, I played Alter Ego by Doechii the other day and someone literally came up to me and said, ‘I’ve been dying to hear that song at a gay club,’ which was really cool.”
Despite his successes, however, Erfaan remains hyperaware of his status as one of the only gay South Asian people DJ-ing in queer venues around Sydney. “It’s still quite challenging,” he says. “I’m still the only brown person DJing at these places.”
“Without naming names, I definitely feel that there are pretty big gay parties where you can look at any line-up—and I’ve done this with friends of mine—and it’s like white, white, white, white, white,” he says.
“But one venue that I think has just been so amazing and supportive is Universal. They’re a great venue because they not only just say that they support diverse communities, but they actually do pride themselves on booking diverse performers.”
For those looking to follow in Erfaan’s steps, he says, “the message that I have for a lot of people who might be doubting themselves, whether you’re a POC, or a trans person, or in a minority group within the LGBTQIA+ community, is that you never know until you try.”
“And it’s a very scary thing—to be someone that’s maybe not-so-accepted in our already segregated community—to say, like, ‘hey, I feel like I’m not represented, and I want myself to be represented.’ It takes a lot of strength to do that.”
DJ Erfaan regularly plays at Newtown Hotel on Friday and Saturday nights. To stay up to date with his upcoming gigs, follow him on Instagram. To relive some of his past sets (including his popular Renaissance (Beyoncé) Mix) visit his Soundcloud.