Steve Aoki is all about chasing a
rush. He cliff-dives, snowboards,
does CrossFit, and happily lets go
of everything when he's in the DJ
booth or crowd-surfing on an
inf latable raft. It's all dopamine,
after all. "I'm drawn to that
feeling," says the Hakkasan and
Wet Republic resident DJ, whose
new album, Neon Future, was
released in September. "I'm not
into drugs. I don't really get drunk
anymore. I find my adrenaline
through music and sports and
poker and things like that."
He's also focusing energy on his
new Vegas house, a 15,600-square-
foot Summerlin mansion that he
calls The Compound and that's
turning into a "Steve Aoki
signature house." His team of
contractors is creating a "multi-
purpose, functional house," he
says, with a studio, rehearsal
space, a multimedia room for
photo and video shoots, and
maybe even a poker room.
"Leaving LA was a difficult
thing to do," says Aoki, who
moved to Vegas from the
Hollywood Hills. "I wanted to
create an environment where I
could have as much of my life as
possible, where I could develop
my music." Now known as an
electro-house wizard, he
remembers playing Vegas gigs
back in 2005, when his friend DJ
AM's open-format mastery ruled
the clubs. Since then, Aoki has
seen many factors turn Vegas into
the world capital of dance and
nightlife: festivals, the Internet
trumping radio and TV as the
way many people discover artists,
the big gamble that Steve Wynn
took on DJs like Aoki in 2010.
He has talked to Tony Hsieh
about Downtown ventures that
could include a place that offers
raw and organic food, or perhaps
a production school to help other
DJs get their start. Vegas is Aoki's
house now, and he's ready to go
hard.
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