King Sleepy

King Sleepy (he/him) hails originally from South London. Growing up on a social housing project with ultra-religious Nigerian parents, music began as an escape for him from the monotony of daily life. Through his teenage years he honed his love for electronic music; experimenting with homemade production set-ups and pirate garage radio, spending lost weekends on sweaty, underground, jungle dance floors, always with the latest sounds on cassette tapes in his bag to swap with friends.

Though he is now Berlin-based, recently he has thrown himself into several pilgrimages to Africa, the Caribbean and Brazil, furthering his understanding and love for myriad types of African and Afro-influenced music, from Nigerian highlife and disco to mystical ceremonial Umbanda and Candomble rhythms of Salvador de Bahia, and the explosive favela-funk sounds of Rio de Janeiro. This led to memorable DJ performances in Bahia and Rio de Janeiro.

Whilst King Sleepy's fast, sexy, sweat-inducing DJ sets stand in contrast to his name, ‘sleep’ is simply a metaphor for his life and the music he likes to create: King Sleepy is a dreamer, and at the same time fascinated by the transcendental energy that envelops dance-floors at night. Hence you will often find King Sleepy behind the decks at some of Berlin’s most notorious, queer, sex-positive and seemingly never-ending parties; taking dancers on provocative, ethereal and otherworldly journeys.