Team Brisk Streamers Of The Week: Team Sly

We are heading down under this week as we visit the Gold Coast, Australia to catch up with the legends that are Team Sly!

Where are you from and where are you living now?

We both originated from Sydney. We moved to sunny QLD eight years ago.

How did you come up with your DJ name?

Funny story! We used to always play under our aliases DJ Syn & Misseloura. Then, in 2013, we were booked to play a party in a park in Sydney. We were billed on the flyer as Team Sly. It kinda stuck from there and we have been this name ever since. it is very rare that we play under our original aliases these days, putting all of our focus into the Team Sly brand.

What’s your equipment list?

For djing: CDJ2000’S, Pioneer 900 nexus mixer, and a few turntables thrown in.
For streaming: we have a pc set up with Streamlabs OBS, 2 x Logitech C922 cameras, and a small streamdeck for scene changes, add-ons etc. We also have a high end gaming pc which we use to produce music, using Ableton as our choice of DAW.

Where did your musical journey begin?

Well, we both were dj’s before we met, with Gary kicking off his dj career in the early 00’s, and Tanya starting around 2007. However, the love for music started a long time before this! It’s pretty fair to say it started the first time we both stepped foot in a rave!

What made you decide to take up DJing?

For Gary, many nights of shuffling on the dancefloor led to an opportunity one evening, of being called up behind the decks to watch the dj and see it from their point of view. Watching the dj and feeling the vibe up there made Gary realise that was something he wanted to experience himself, so he began to learn the craft. His first setup was very basic, using a CDJ walkman and a belt driven turntable to learn to mix. Later on, after upgrading to two turntables, Gary produced a mix and handed it to a promoter, landing his first gig at an event called Heaven & Hell in Bondi, Sydney.

For Tanya, it really started in the late nineties, watching the dj’s on the big stages. Not knowing any dj’s personally, Tanya wasnt really sure where to begin with learning, and mucked around on mixing software in the early 2000’s, making mixes for fun. Of course, without any understanding of music structure, these early mixes were not very good! Years went by, and after having her first child and staying home from clubs, she realised there was still a fire inside her for music, and couldn’t ignore it any longer. Tanya purchased about ten vinyl and her first decks – belt drives, and started teaching herself how to mix. In 2007, Tanya still didn’t really know any of the dj’s closely, and wasn’t sure how to get herself ‘noticed’ to receive club gigs. Over time, with a little help from Myspace, Facebook, and friends, Tanya began to meet promoters and scored her first vinyl gig at Space Nightclub, playing house music. It wasn’t long after this (March 2008) that Gary saw Tanya playing hard trance in a club, they met, and have been together since!

What are some of your interests/hobbies/passions outside of streaming/DJing?

Gary has always been a massive gamer, and this is one hobby that will never go away. He loves gaming on playstation mostly. Gary also has a love for photography and takes photos for various events, including weddings, baby shoots, nature, and more recently, club photography. This year Gary has branched out with his club photography, and often takes photos in Brisbane as well as interstate for promoters. Gary will be taking his first ‘officially booked’ international photos soon!

Tanya has a very creative flair and classes herself as a little bit of an entrepreneur. Over the years, Tanya has turned a few hobbies/passions into businesses. For the past twenty years, Tanya has been a cake decorator (self taught) and for many years was making cakes (including wedding, celebration, 3D design) for family, friends, and beyond. Due to her sales role which requires a lot of travel, Tanya only makes the occasional one these days. Also, from 2005 till 2007, during the time as a stay at home Mum, Tanya developed, produced and sold ‘modern cloth nappies’ online to the new parent community, under the brand name Tango Nappies. If you’re not sure what a modern cloth nappy is, give it a google, it’s rather interesting!

Other hobbies include graphic design, music production, and the latest one that Tanya would like to pursue is making high end perfumes.

When did you start streaming on Twitch?

Whilst we were hesitant to try out Twitch as we didn’t really understand it to begin with, we have been streaming on there for over twelve months now. It’s the only streaming platform we use now.

Is there anything you really hope to accomplish in your life, whether it be related to music or not?

Most of our joint goals relate to music and travel. Our first goal is to take the children to Hawaii, which we are doing next year. Musically, we would like to play overseas again, and there are a few amazing Australian club brands that we secretly hope to get booked for one day! Lastly, we still want to take the trip of a lifetime we planned a few years ago, but had to cancel. England, Scotland, France, Italy, & Singapore. Can’t wait to replan that one sometime soon!

Who are some of your favourite streamers? Why?

There are sooo many, but Psymill is one of our favourites, he has so much character on the mic and his music room is so creative! Other favourites would be DjAmber_D, dj_soul_t, FloodyDJ, mattadamnz, JASEHHOUSE, DarkSin, and of course the man himself, DjBrisk.

What is your favourite genre to play? Why?

Hard House! It’s such a bouncy sound, and mixing it is so much fun. However, we play (and love!) many styles, from tech house, trance, techno, hard trance, reverse bass, and happy hardcore.

What are some of the most memorable events you’ve participated in or streamed?

Club wise, playing at Masif in Sydney a few times was a huge bucket list. Our top most favourite event would have to be playing on a boat party in London. Spinning hard house vinyl cruising along the river Thames…seriously one of the best days of our lives! From a streaming perspective, we thoroughly enjoy being part of raid trains, and love meeting new dj’s this way. Our most memorable stream would have to be our 24 hour live stream last year, to raise money for the stillbirth foundation. We are looking to do a 12 hour one soon, once again for charity.

Recently, we had the pleasure of running an event called ‘Twitch IRL’ in Brisbane, which is a concept Dj Soul T from Melbourne developed. It’s a gathering in a real life venue of Twitch streamers, that is also streamed online, with all proceeds going to the Black Dog Institute. It was a great day and we hope there is more!

We have been running events in Brisbane for the past 7-8 years, with two main brands, Heaven & Hell, and Beatwave, as well as other events such as summer/autumn/winter beats, Lunacy, and ‘Team Sly presents’. We also ran a few RVRS BASS parties in Brisbane.

Beatwave is our brand for purely all things hard house. We had retired the multigenre Heaven & Hell brand for several years with our focus being on hard house, but we have decided to hold a reunion party, which will happen on November 4th, in Fortitude Valley. Here’s the link for event page: https://www.facebook.com/events/397194222012663

Two of our favourite events to date are a party we held in 2017 featuring Mark Breeze, and our first all hard house party, featuring Dj Brisk.

What does Team Brisk mean to you?

We love the comunity vibe,and it’s great seeing people share the Team Brisk love on Twitch all the time. The man himself, Brisk, has put so much hard work behind the scenes into growing the Team Brisk group, and we have met some amazing dj’s through it

What’s your favourite thing about DJing on Twitch?

It’s really great for us, as we have four children at home. We get to be home with our family and play and chat with friends. With such busy lifestyles, we rarely get the chance to catch up with friends. Twitch helps us to feel connected to our friends and fellow dj’s, its amazing. Also, as Tanya travels a lot for work, playing music together at home is a great way to enjoy precious time together, and keeps the spark alive!

What is a challenge you’ve faced as a DJ/streamer?

Aside from occasional scene politics, or spammers/bots on chat, the whole musical journey has been great for us.

Do you have any special projects, streams or events you would like to tell us about?

For us, we are enjoying playing once or twice a week, which fits well into our busy routine. Whilst we don’t have any major projects on the horizon, we are still running our occasional club events and producing when we can. We have some awesome interstate gigs to announce soon also.

From a production perspective, we have been producing for the past 6 years, firstly with Reverse Bass, and now Hard House. In the early days, we had two releases on Blutonium Records – LuxDelano & Team Sly – Just F…, and Ed E.T & DTR & Team Sly – Move Your Body, which reached number 1, and number 3 in the ‘Top 100 Hardstyle Tracks’ on Trackitdown.

For the past 3 years, we have produced hard house, releasing close to 50 tracks, with many of them sold on Toolbox Digital, which is a site dedicated to all things hard house. We have been lucky to have just about all of them reach number 1 in the Toolbox Digital top 100 charts.

Is there anyone you’d like to shout out and/or thank?

The biggest thanks is to Brisk and for having us as part of his amazing team. Although we haven’t been overly active within the Facebook group, we are honoured to be a part of this music family, and really enjoy jumping into Team Brisk channels whenever we can.

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