HE4RTBROKEN co-founder Liyo condenses the collective’s feelings-forward approach to club music down into an hour of pure emotion.
Liyo is one of the masterminds behind the beloved purveyor of club melodrama HE4RTBROKEN, the Belgian collective and club night that isn’t scared of a few tears on the dance floor. Alongside Steff, Munix and ssaliva, Liyo hand crafts parties, ambient concerts, AV shows and sad-songs-only karaoke sessions, bringing emotion-forward, heart-filling, life-affirming music to kindred sad spirits in Brussels, Paris, Berlin, London and Shanghai. Counting noted feelings enjoyers Malibu, Sky H1, Asmara, Palmistry, Oli XL, Toxe and DJ Python as just some of their bookings, HE4RTBROKEN provides a sanctuary for those who are just as in their feelings as they are on niche production forums and esoteric SoundCloud circles.
Splitting her time between music and working as a film editor, Liyo’s attitude towards sets, which she builds as multi-textured narratives of emotional undulation and cathartic release, are very much informed by her editing expertise. “Both music and cinema are time-based arts, thus can make you experience emotions in this very total, unspeakable way, that’s the parallel I like to draw,” she explains. “Editing is basically sculpting time, cutting down and assembling all these pieces of time that were recorded in the raw material to create a new piece of time. It’s so powerful to think that someone might spend a little portion of their lifetime inside this short journey you’ve crafted for them, be it for one hour of a movie, or a mix.”
Liyo’s Fact mix is no exception, seeing her splice together contemporary club sounds with modern classics, tempering sound system heaters with some killer edits and a few genuine curveballs, including an inspired sequence in which Ana Caprix melts elegantly into ‘Toms’ Diner’. “I wanted to try and shrink a whole club night into one hour, to have the full emotional trip,” says Liyo. “To me, a club night is about this moment of communion, this euphoria of togetherness that you share with friends and strangers alike through music, but it’s also something impossible to capture as it’s just an ephemeral moment of awe.”It can be very melancholic in a way.”
You can find Liyo on Instagram, SoundCloud and at her website.
Tracklist:
T2 & Jodie – ‘Heartbroken’ (Acapella)
Adam F – ‘Circles’
LU2K – ‘Prema’
Sara Landry – ‘Skate’
Regal86 – ‘da fleet’
Tirzah – ‘Hips’ (Loraine James remix)
Jana Rush – ‘Chill Mode’
DJ Rashad – ‘In Da Club Before Eleven O’Clock’
Hyas – ‘Digital Drumz’
Dove – ‘Figues’ [Feat. Loota]
Basile3 – ‘Echo Toi’
Röyksopp – ‘Poor Leno’
Overmono – ‘Quadraluv’
Omar S – ‘100% House’
Vegyn – ‘B4 The Computer Crash’
Ana Caprix – ‘New Again’
DNA – ‘Tom’s Diner’ [Feat. Suzanne Vega]
James K – ‘Rihanna’
dj lostboi – ‘SEE INSIDE’
nevrland – ‘MY BOYS (NEVRLAND EDIT)’
Tove Lo – ‘Habits (Stay High) (Hippie Sabotage Remix)’
Listen next: Fact Mix – LYZZA
