In Session: Jane Fitz

Jane Fitz has been perfecting the art of the DJ set since the mid 90s.

She's a long-serving selector, crate digger and promoter and is, basically, as dedicated to dance music as anyone can be.

And she's in it for the holistic reasons that underpin rave culture: freedom in sound, the communities that form on the dancefloor, parties and dancing as anti-capitalist action. Those things so oft forgotten, but not by Fitz. She's a real OG.

"To me an event is 10,000 people and a bouncy castle somewhere deep in the countryside until midday the next day," she told Inverted Audio. "It’s not a club night, or a party. I think people’s attitudes to parties have been, whether they realise it or not, completely governed by a selfless property market and the diminishing amount of available space that is left. Clubs get closed and the land sold to developers, and the crappy areas get colonised, leaving nowhere to turn the volume up. Because of that venues charge the earth, which means promoters have to charge big-ticket prices, and in doing so, have to put on names to attract big crowds. It’s economics but it’s ruined what parties should be about."

Her blindingly good DJ sets, which are fuelled by her mouth-watering record collection, have earned a reputation among fans of house and techno played with soul. They'll have heard her at Freerotation, the UK festival where she's been a resident for half a decade, or at one of her parties, Peg (which ran from 1999 to 2009) and Night Moves (organised with Jade Seatle), which celebrates its fourth birthday in London this month.

Indeed, she's the toast of those in the know, beloved of people in the dance and behind the scenes. Her 2016 gig list boasts the Bloc., Dekmantel, Further Future and Gottwood festivals, clubs like Tresor, Concrete and Corsica Studios and promoters Krankbrother and Secretsundaze. Quality always speaks for itself.