Jae Tallawah aka TU3SDAY awarded AZ Mag creative grant in collaboration with DJ Mag

Birmingham-based electronic music artist and community organiser Jae Tallawah, aka TU3SDAY, has been awarded an AZ Mag creative grant in collaboration with DJ Mag.

It’s the second year that AZ Mag, an award-nominated online community and platform for Queer Trans Intersex Black People & People of Colour (QTIBPOC), has awarded five recipients a £1,000 creative grant. In the summer of 2020, AZ raised £25,000 to support Black LGBTQ+ creatives, and pledged £10,000 of those funds to individuals seeking to develop a project of their choosing. 

This year, with the remaining half of the funds, five more individuals have been awarded £1,000 each. DJ Mag's partnership with AZ set to provide sponsorship for genderqueer and genre-expansive artist TU3SDAY's electronic music-focused project, as part of our commitment to continue supporting Black creatives in the music industry.

As a disabled producer and DJ — the Boxout resident’s music is "made by, for and with people who live at similar intersections" as them. As part of the AZ Creative Fund they will be creating their second EP, with a focus on using hardware and AI to make the process accessible to them. The project will "prioritise working with neurominorities and re-imagining their existing music to bring it to reach the expansive audiences that exist in the world of electronic music".

TU3SDAY's four-track debut EP from August this year, 'LOVE + RAGE', was co-produced with Mono Joe, and fuses elements of house, garage, drum & bass, UK drill and gospel music. 'LOVE + RAGE' was distributed independently via Virgin Music Label and Artist Services and gained support from Jamz Supernova, Mary Anne Hobbs as well as DJ Mag and SWU FM. 

You can follow TU3SDAY's journey here, and check out their music here. Read more about TU3SDAY in this month's Emerging Artists feature.

You can read about the other recipients of AZ Mag's 2022 Creative Fund via their website. 

Over the past seven years, AZ have created a self-funded, award-nominated online community. Since it’s birth in 2015, AZ, founded by four queer Black women, has developed into an online publication and social space, as well as event organisers, for LGBTQ+ people of colour. 

Speaking about the fund, AZ said: "AZ Mag has and will always aim to support and amplify the work of QTBPOC and the AZ Creative Fund is another way of doing that. We are so excited to read all the applications from all the talented individuals and collectives."

Last year, DJ mag sponsored and mentored one recipient of the creative fund, Xīlhu Ayebaitari Ese, to create a Dance music project. Ayebaitari launched Queer Rave: a community project that celebrates and represents queer, female and genderqueer Drum & Bass DJs.

(Photo: @exileartisa)