Phoenix teenager is one of city’s top lowrider scratch DJs

At just 19 years old, Angelina "DJ Nina" Garza is making soundwaves in the DJ scene from metro Phoenix to Los Angeles with a dope twist: spinning vinyl records in an era dominated by digital music and apps. Unlike many of her teenage peers, Garza deeply appreciates the classic, tactile experience of vinyl records.

"I do have two full milk crates of vinyl," she says. "They are a big mixture of music such as Amy Winehouse, Too Short, Tom Petty, Evelyn Champagne King, Hi-C, and Tony A — along with small scratching audio vinyl."

The latter of the vinyl list has specific soundbites to help create scratch sounds with her two turntables. The art of scratching is when Garza moves the vinyl record back and forth rapidly. Think about speeding up a TikTok video at 10 times the speed and placing a specific one- or two-second second sped-up clip in multiple backward and forward successions. Now imagine each clip having its own musical note and tone. Garza's hand-eye-ear coordination of the analog vinyl records is audio artistry in motion.
Another tool used to create the scratch sound is the mixer, an electronic device with sliders and switches. It's connected to and usually placed in the middle of two turntables; it tweaks the volume and tones derived from the turntables' needles reading the vinyl record.

"I’m currently trying to perfect my favorite scratch, 'the crab scratch,' with different combinations to enter or end it off with," she says.

A crab scratch is done when Garza finds a specific part of the record — like, on the Amy Winehouse "Help Yourself" track when the late singer harmonizes the "I can't help ya if you won't help yourself" lyrics. Garza pivots the mixer's fader controller with her fingers on one hand as a piano player who'd play rapid trill notes. The other hand, simultaneously, is moving the "Help Yourself" record. The "crab" scratch sound emitted can be sped up or slowed down based on the speed of the finger/hand movements on the turntables and mixer.

The true artistry, which Garza is practicing daily to master, is when the two devices are not theoretically in synch, yet they create a cohesive and appealing sound — as music on its own.

At First Friday in May, Garza spun on the "ones and twos" at the Heard Museum in central Phoenix. Garza was at home with her fellow artists: sneakerheads hand-painting sneakers, others spray painting canvasses and girl breakdancers, also known as b-girls.

"I love playing the classics for breakdancers like 'The Party Has Just Begun' by Freestyle, 'Egypt Egypt' by the Egyptian Lover and 'Jam on It' by Newcleus," she says.

The above-mentioned electro songs came out around 1984, at the same time breakin' was showcased strictly as a dance with Lionel Ritchie at the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. And now, 40 years later, breakdancing will be an official sport at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.

"I think breakdancers repping the Olympics is the coolest thing I’ve heard," Garza says. "Getting to that level takes a lot of practice and hard work."

The term “break” in the hip-hop culture comes from when the DJs would play and loop a portion of a song — mostly the funky part when dancers would let loose. "One song I would do that for is in the 46 seconds into "Egypt Egypt" to build up suspense," Garza says. She'd loop the part of the song where the vocoder robot voice and heavy breathing sound dropped from the song, leaving the heavy bass produced by the Roland TR-808 drum machine.

Repeating and looping a beat is also called "beat juggling," she explains. "It's repeating a beat or word in a track with both turntables." She'd loop some breakbeats for minutes and then mix them up. "One thing I enjoy doing is using an intro beat, grabbing the second beat after the click and doubling it with the first beat so it sounds like there’s an extra beat in the middle."

The main objective of a DJ, no matter what genre of music they're playing, is to keep the party dancing. The choice of music is vital, as is the personality of the DJ behind the equipment and loudspeakers. Then, the more tricks the DJ has to wow the listeners, the better the overall vibe will be.

In April, Garza spun cannabis-infused tracks for a B-Real meet-and-greet in the Valley. Some joints she played were from the albums of Dr. Dre ("The Chronic"), Snoop Dogg ("Doggystyle"), and Cypress Hill ("Black Sunday") — the latter founded by B-Real and his group mates in 1989.

In February, Garza spun old-school funk tracks by Zapp, Cameo, The Bar-kays and Con Funk Shun at Frank's Car Show & Super Hop in Glendale. She was set up by the lowriders hopping more than 12 feet in the air.

Much of the music the teenager gravitates to was released long before she was born, around the time of her father's youth.

"My dad helped me get my first big show when I was 13," she recounts. "It was for Chicano rapper Lil Rob."

Garza's love for DJing began at a much younger age.

Garza was born in 2005, around the same time her father, Jeremy Garza, joined the Majestics Car Club. "Growing up, I was always helping my two other sisters set up my dad's lowrider car display and chilling in the lowrider by myself afterward," Garza recounts. "I was always very quiet and to myself."

But young Garza was drawn to the DJ music on the stage. "But that’s what made my love for DJing become a thing because I was able just to look around and sit near the DJ and listen to all the cool tricks and songs they were playing."

At 10, her younger sister, Mia, put Garza's trajectory in motion. "Mia was the first to buy me my first small mixer board nine years ago," Garza recalls. "She had $100 in Christmas money and was the first one to believe in me with my passion for DJing."

Garza's parents saw how hard the then-tween DJ was working at small backyard parties and parking lot events, so they purchased her a Numark NS7 on OfferUp from DJ Brandon, who spins at Barrio Queen in Glendale and local weddings and quincñeras. At the request of her dad, DJ Brandon taught Garza the fundamentals of DJing.

"We spent a few months on certain days all learning how to work the NS7 controller and organize the program I was using on my old Dell computer." Unlike the separate analog turntables, the NS7 is an all-in-one digital DJ system with two platters. On the platters, the DJ can simulate scratching and blending with vinyl. It has a built-in mixer and is connected to a laptop with the Serato music-mixing and management program.

"I would hear other DJs say that Serato was more of a cheat code because most who use it don’t know how to mix by ear or figured out the beats per minute," she recounts. "So I would practice with my computer facing down to mix without looking at the screen to gain those skills."

But there was more to learn besides the technical hand-eye-ear coordination.

DJ Brandon taught young Garza "how to properly control a crowd and what DJs do for proper events, which was a very big learning experience for me that stuck with me," she continues. Her father got a Guitar Center credit card and bought the loudspeakers, agreeing that the gig money Garza made would pay off the bills "to teach me financial responsibility in my hobbies; it took long to pay it back, but it was a big boost in my path."

After Garza became proficient in DJing with the NS7 module and Serato program on her laptop, she purchased turntables and vinyl records.

"When I did come across vinyl, I tried collecting them, and through the years, I was able to get enough," she says. "I focused more on building my equipment for events."
As of late, the 19-year-old DJ owns and uses two Pioneer PLX-1000 turntables and a Pioneer DJM-S9 mixer and still rocks the Numark NS7 controller she learned on. "I currently use Ortofon Scratch Concorde needles," she adds.

The issue with needles is that they get worn out from vigorous scratching, and "some concerts have stages where it’s too wobbly, so my actual needles would jump," she says, meaning the music would abruptly skip or stop.

So as a remedy, she added Phase remotes to her mixology repertoire, that mount on top of the records atop the turntables. Utilizing sensors, the remotes analyze the rotation, direction, movement, and speed of the turntables and records. Then, the sensors wirelessly transmit the musical information to the receiver.

While using Phase remote units, Garza's heart and soul still remain old school. "I prefer the touch of actual needles," she says.

In the last few years, through mentorships with concert promoter Chris Cano, singer-and-rapper MC Magic and Power 98.3's DJ Nicasio, Garza has learned the professionalism that comes with being a DJ on the rise. She's headlining some of the most significant events in metro Phoenix and beyond.

"The best part of DJing is that you're always learning something new," Garza says. "You can have countless years into it, but there are always new combos or tricks that can spin the wheels in your head for wanting more."

But as mentioned earlier, there's more to DJing than meets the eye — and, in this case, the ear. Garza's dedication to her craft and love for vinyl set her apart, making her a standout talent in metro Phoenix's DJ community.

"Being a woman in the music/DJ industry can have its moments that can either make or break me, but having my family by my side through it all just motivates me to keep going," she concludes. "There had been moments when people thought they were able to step over me or control me with what I do, but I stand up for myself because I never allow someone to think it’s their place to choose if I’m worthy or not in something I spent years into.

"This is definitely a male-dominated industry, but times are changing, and I just want to continue to encourage and support more women who want to step in without fear to show that it’s not limited to a certain group that can DJ."

DJ Nina will be spinning at the Tios and Tias event at Club DWNTWN, 702 N. Central Avenue, on Sunday. The event runs 1 to 8 p.m. To keep up with her future appearances, follow @djninag on Instagram.