Before moving to San Francisco, Iranian-Canadian artist AIDA got her start in one of the world's more unlikely, yet nourishing, rave scenes tucked away in the southwest corner of Canada: Vancouver. There, amongst the basement raves, forest parties and yeast-perfumed gigs on top of bakeries, she found a home amidst a small but strong scene of record-digging minimal lovers, finding power in their pure passion for music. This is where she started, though over time her sound has developed along with a lot of the minimal scene, touching on electro, breaks and progressive house.

The latter is the focus of her RA Podcast, which comes amidst a year-long sabbatical from her dayjob to focus on music. It seems like the extra time is paying off: she's playing out more than ever, around the world, and playing more kinds of music, too. This mix revolves entirely around her love for the original wave of progressive house, gathered from records chosen over a period of weeks and then put together with a firm but idiosyncratic touch, as she explains below. It's as much a testament to the timelessness of this music as the cyclical nature of dance music, though it's also a bit of history lesson, a reminder of the broad world of sounds and rhythms beyond the au courant revival.

When she's not DJing, AIDA also runs a record label rooted in activism around her Iranian heritage. Inspired partly by the Woman Life Freedom movement in Iran, her imprint Apranik Records focuses on artists of Iranian and Persian heritage from the country and across the diaspora, as well as raising money for charities and nonprofits.

@aida-dj

Read more at https://ra.co/podcast/907