Interview: NYC's Top DJs On Their Favorite Gigs, Best After-Hours Spots, And More!

Jonny Sollis

To some, Jonny Sollis, aka Jonny Famous is known as an actor and comedian. Along with his comedy partner, the Fat Jew, he's made hilarious and popular videos which can be seen around the web, and has written shows for cable networks. However, for the last 13 years Jonny has also developed a reputation as one of the best DJs in New York. He caught out attention spinning a few fashion parties, where we realized he was the same DJ holding down the most fun nights at The Jane and The Westway every week. Sollis spent his life in NYC, and when his friends would come home for breaks during college, they turned to him to show them around nightlife. Eventually, he began to throw his own parties, and with the encouragement of friends like Chrissie Miller, Jesse Marco, and James Cruickshank, he eventually fell into DJing ("I actually joke around, I give Chrissie credit for both of my careers in a weird way. She introduced me to my friends who put me in my first commercial and she gave me my first DJ gig so...") and has been a fixture of NYC nightlife since. Stay up to date with Jonny Sollis at @jonnysollis Where can we see you play? I do Fridays at the Jane and Saturdays at Westway. I've been doing Saturdays at the Westway since the first Saturday it opened, it's sort of my party. Favorite album of 2013 so far. Yeezus. I know I sound so corny. The other album I thought was actually incredible was Major Lazer's new album, Free The Universe. Favorite song of 2013 so far. I really was obsessed with this song called "Royals" by this girl Lorde from New Zealand. I did a mixtape with Sam Ronson last spring where we opened it up with that song. I loved Duke Dumont "Need U 100%." There's a song called "Watch Out For This" on Major Lazer's album that's also my new favorite song. Song you never play. Gangnam style? I always treat DJing as a mix of what I want to hear and what they want to hear. They go out and spend money at a nightclub, they don't give a shit what I like. I mean some people do. They want to hear what they want to hear. Song we'll always hear you play. Recently it's been a lot of stuff off Major Lazer's new album, as well as Dillon Francis' stuff. I like to keep the crowd guessing, and play songs they really know but wouldn't normally hear when going out. I do a mash-up where I do "Jolene" by Dolly Parton and I cut it up with Daft Punk's "Robot Rock" and it really goes well. And a lot of people hear "Jolene" and they go "whoa, that's weird." Weirdest request you've ever gotten. Truthfully I've been places where people come up to me and play my song. I've had rappers and people in the club come up and be like "yo here's my track," coming up with a zip drive. I try to play dumb like "oh I don't know how to do it," and then they try to teach me and open it up in Serato. I remember Cam'ron performed at the Westway and I was DJing, and he was like "yo play my new song." I was like "I don't have it," and he was like "whoa, you gotta stay relevant pop!" I was like, "I don't even know your new song." What song do you trust to turn the crowd up? Robin S. "Show Me Love." It's a go-to dance song. That is a song I play every single time I DJ. I invented playing that song, I love that song (laughs). That's a song I play if the crowd is corny, if the crowd is cool, if it's old, it's young; that's a song everyone likes. All-time favorite gig you played. I'm not gonna lie, this year I DJ'd at Princeton for their alumni reunion weekend. I was like "oh it's gonna be a bunch of lads having a lager, talking about books," and I showed up and it was ten thousand kids in neon tank tops behind a barricade being like "lets go," crowd surfing, shooting water guns in the air. I was like holy shit, awesome. It was also just the magnitude of the crowd. I thought it would be two hundred people there, and it was straight up ten thousand. I also got to DJ for the Knicks a couple of times last year at MSG. Princeton might have been the most fun, but DJing for the Knicks at MSG was probably the coolest thing I've done. What's your dream event? I want to DJ Suri Cruise's wedding. Whenever she gets married, I want to DJ her wedding. That's my dream.