ARE YOU XPERIENCED?

word: ANDREW LAZAR

The eccentric trio known as the Devine Xperience, from LA, blasted onto the EDM scene this year with a mesmerizing array of electronics that intertwine elements of breakbeat, dubstep, trap and trance. Robert Devine creates and records the music, while Vanessa Garic sings and is also the Creative Director guiding the artistic and visual aspects of the group while lending her skills as a live performer. Enki Siruz is their personal audio engineer, adding the finishing touches to the music. Having recently released their eponymous debut album on Keoki Records, hitting the top ten in iTunes electronic music chart, DJ Mag USA quizzed Robert on the band's Devine inspiration....

Can you tell our readers about your group?
“The Devine Xperience makes music in an artistic manner, rather than in a formulaic way. We offer a mind-altering music dimension that has never been presented in the same unique arrangement before. We don't follow any format or genre, we just create music in the studio that is pleasing to our ears; no boundaries, no boxes and no fear.” 

How did The Devine Xperience all come together?
“Vanessa Garic is my wife and the story of how we met is a love story that will have to be re-visited in a future interview, due to the depth of just that answer alone! She is a creative force, she paints the most unique art I've ever seen and her voice is very unique, it was just natural that we would create music together.

“We met Enki Siruz at a rave while watching Cookie Monsta perform, and instantly clicked. He explained to us that he was attending The Musicians Institute in Hollywood for Audio Engineering and a light bulb went off in my head. I thought, 'This guy is the missing link to our music,' so we invited him to our recording studio, Robert’s Recording Laboratory, and he took our songs to the next level with his scientific approach and attention to detail.”

What do you feel is the biggest contributing factor to your success so far?
“We feel as though it is definitely a combination of putting out a quality product, then following that up with endless amounts of time and energy spent on actively marketing and promoting each individual event and release we have, then finally having the right team behind us. We have been super lucky to have had Mystic Pete from KXLU Los Angeles 88.9FM supporting our project since day one, he really took a big chance by playing our music on his weekly radio show In a Dream. Also Urban Decibel Radio put us into rotation early on, and that really helped us out as well. Lastly, we were extremely lucky to have some of the greatest writers in the industry actively take interest in our project and review it in major magazines and online publications.”

You just released your first album two months ago. How did you push it to the success it's achieved so far?
“Really investing in ourselves, both in terms of both time and money. We really take our music career seriously, and realize that we not only have to consistently create new songs and experiences that are groundbreaking and keep our fans excited, but also actively interact with our fans. We take the time to try and respond and thank each and every one of them for every interaction they make with us, whether it is direct communication with us via www.thedevinexperience.com, or via our other social networking sites. We have spared no expense when it comes to advertising and marketing our music to get it out to the right people so that we at least have a fair shot of reaching our target audience. The competition is fierce and we love to take challenges head on, it makes every day interesting.”

How does it feel to have your record selling at some of the most legendary record stores in the nation?
"It has been a dream of ours to be able to walk into legendary record stores like Amoeba Records, or Street Sounds in Los Angeles, and others like Dr. Freeclouds Records Shoppe in Orange County and to see our album on the shelf for sale to the general public. Honestly we hoped that we would have this opportunity when we were creating the artwork for the album. We made the cover so that it would grab our attention if we saw it on the shelf at the records store. I can't tell you how many albums I have bought because I just loved the cover."

Since your album was released, what have you been working on in the meantime? Is there new material coming soon?
"We just released the DJ remixes of the album from DJ D-Xtreme, Decoding Jesus vs. The Duke and The Kaiser, and Scott Weiser of Pain Device, Jackal & Hyde, and Dynamix II. We are also releasing a new music video for our song 'The Answer.' It was shot by famed photographer and music video director Don Ptashnem with the help of Rona Lu, and it is currently being edited by Aaron 'Tails' Preciado at Full Spectrum Visuals, who, by the way, do the visuals and live video mixing at all of the biggest raves and festivals out here in the west coast. We are very excited about this music video release and are grateful to Let's Beat Milo Records and Keoki records for making it happen. I am also working on a new The Duke and The Kaiser project with Edgar Montiel and the follow up album with The Devine Xperience, both to be released next year."

The Devine Xperience also recently did a remix out of Scratche's “B.A.S.” which is out now on Base Industry Records.