R-ASH started DJing in 1996 and came to it through rap, in the years when flow was everything. Nikkfurie introduces him as seven-time world champion and three-time vice-champion. For R-ASH, scratching is a rhythmic instrument: you place yourself on the beat like a rapper does with words, which is why a good scratch can feel like an extra MC on a track.

He looks at how DJing has changed: bookings now go to notoriety more than skill, controllers have made the craft popular, and few DJs can scratch on today's slow beats. Scratching has not disappeared, he says; it is a smaller share of a practice that has grown much bigger. Today he spends more time producing than scratching, and his tracks go towards UK garage and future R&B rather than the sound people expect from a hip hop DJ.

He also explains how he made a living from it: a weekly show on an associative radio in Toulon as a teenager, then Radio FG in Paris, his own parties when promoters did not pay enough, and tours. The biggest one was the last NTM tour, over two years, with DJ Pone, in front of 20,000 to 100,000 people a night. His rule: wear several hats, so that when one activity is quiet, another keeps going.

His comeback release is « She Wanna », a reinterpretation of a Donell Jones R&B classic in a two-step garage spirit. He chose HYK because he wants to reach the people who really care about his work, outside the algorithms, and set his own price. All his future releases will be on HYK to buy, in WAV quality for DJs.

« She Wanna » and his remixes are on his HYK page.