iPad DJ Rana June (image: Marilyn Tang)

A year ago, I wrote about a budding innovator, entrepreneur and musician who had this whacky idea that the iPad could be use to make and mix music. The trolls came out in droves when I profiled ‘iPad DJ’ Rana June Sobhany. What a difference a year makes.

The point of the profile that I wrote on Rana was to highlight her innovation in using the iPad to create music as an art form regardless of quality. The pushback was fast and furious, questioning everything from her musical ability (which she has since proven) to the definition of a “DJ” to the equipment being used. The haters missed the point, which was to highlight the innovation, the use of new technology in way that wasn’t being done at the time.

So a year later, I had a chance to catch up with Rana during a recent visit to New York City. A lot has changed for this budding rock star. She’s still making music on the iPad, but the thing is, now she’s making a living making music on the iPad. Take that!

You see, people — and companies — pay for innovation. They pay to see it, they pay to have it and they recognize it for what it is. It also helps if you are the only one doing what you are doing.

Rana has a infectious personality. After spending a couple minutes with her, you are infused with her energy as if it’s a viral (airborne) transmission. This is my second time meeting her in person, and I try my best to soak up her energy, because walking around in New York City tired me out. We pull up to the counter at a Japanese restaurant in Midtown and order a couple of hot green teas. She’s bubbling with excitement, like a child with a brain full of new information. So I start with something obvious, the old “where are you now” bit.

“Where I am is absolutely not where I thought I’d be a year ago today,” Rana says in between sips of tea. “The things that have happened in the past 12 months have blown me away. I think it’s kind of telling in the way this space (mobile) moves. I originally thought I would just be a catalyst, that what I was doing would spark a whole slew of iPad DJs running around making music. I think people underestimated how hard it is to do what I do, and that I was just hitting ‘play’ on an iPod or something, rather than creating music on the fly. We’re still not seeing widespread adoption of this art form, which turns out to be great for me. It’s still novel, it’s still new, and people love seeing it happen in person. I love playing music for people. It’s changed me.”

Rana is right: mobile moves quickly. And while she was innovating with one technology, the rest of it was morphing and continuously moving around her. However, the seed was set and she set out to become a success doing what she loved to do, make music on the iPad. Rana is no newcomer to mobile technology. She even wrote a book on it that came out earlier this year, and built her own mobile analytics company. She’s got the inside track.

I switch gears and ask her about her book, Mobilize: Strategies for Success from the Frontlines of the App Revolution, which isn’t exactly a New York Times bestseller, and even shortly after its release may already be behind the fast times it captures. Even Rana seemed a bit nostalgic about it, already.

“I view the book as a historical benchmark for the first 500 days of the App Store — the olden days of the App Store, as it were. I had the opportunity to take the first 500 days of the App Store and condense it in 55k words and I’m grateful for that. If we aren’t able to know what it was in the beginning, then it’s harder to work on best practices for the future. I wrote the book as a third party observer, and I’m proud of it because we have something that memorializes that point in time.”

Our appetizers arrive. I’ve got what appears to be spring rolls, she’s ordered some snap peas. In between bites, we talk about the reason we are both in New York, the New York International Auto Show (NYIAS). I was there to report on safety technology, she was there to open the show for Kia – literally. She set up her DJ stand and introduced three new Kia cars, through music she composed to match each car. Thankfully, there is video for this performance, and I’m pretty sure Kia is loving the fact that I’ve posted it below.

Aside from opening the Kia presentation, over the past year Rana has played over 100 shows from iconic venues such as Webster Hall to the House of Blues. She has traveled to Iceland, all over Europe, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Toronto, Miami, Boston, Amsterdam, London, Berlin and many more. She’s played at Google, and performed four shows for the company that makes it all possible (as far as the technology, not compensation) – Apple. She exclaims, “I think the most exciting moment was when Steve Wozniak came to my show!

Not only did Wozniak go to one of Rana’s shows in San Francisco, but he had this to say about the performance: “I’d heard of Rana’s fame but had no idea what she or any DJ did. Now I have a better idea. I wish I’d had that much talent and energy when I designed computers!”

I ask if that was a bit mind-blowing for her, but she quickly replies, “The people that think this is cool, it’s equally mind-blowing. No one cared when I was a published author, but as soon as I started performing, they cared.”

Howard Mittman (left) checking out Rana's iPad set-up (image: Stephanie Paciullo)

During her performance for Kia, she happened to spot WIRED publisher Howard Mittman in the crowd and as she often does with fans during her concerts, pulled him up on stage to show him how to mix on the iPad. He was impressed with the use of the iPad for DJ’ing. The iPad has changed the way we do mobile, which I did not see coming when Icriticized it as nothing more than a large iPod Touch. Rana agrees.

“The iPad changed the course of my life. I think what is starting to happen now is the iPad is shaping the way we consume technology. Everyone that has an iPad has it around them and with them all the time. No more hot laptops on the lap, just this elegant and intuitive piece of glass. The iPad gave me the freedom to be creative all the time, no matter where I am. My ultimate belief is that if more people create music, then the more the good music will be appreciated. It’s about letting people try to make stuff on their own.”

Of course, that’s creation, but what about development, I ask. “Developers are having to think about these apps on several screens across devices,” she says. “The iPad has disrupted the way developers are actually making the apps too. They have had to adapt and advance. Consumers are getting trained to use mobile devices in way they haven’t before.”

Later, I’d ask Howard his thoughts on Rana’s performance and her use of the iPads. “Every once in a while you see something that stops and makes you want to see more of it, much more,” he told me via email. “That’s how I felt at the Kia booth that day when I saw her spinning. Her use of those iPads is proof that even the potential of the world’s coolest technologies can’t be fully realized until artists get a chance to make them truly sing!”

As dinner hits the table (I ordered something decisively curry, while she has a sensible plate of sashimi) she goes on, explaining that technology and the delivery mechanisms for art are changing. I’m intrigued, but the curry is really good so I ask her to pause for a second. Pausing is hard for Rana, as she’s running non-stop. She says she’s a bit worn out, but I don’t see it. Though later we’ll be invited to an after party by a hotel developer, which she turns down – only then can I see the weariness in her eyes. At the moment though, she bubbles with energy as she explains the following to me, with fevered excitement and speed.

“Technology is universal; we have direct access to people that was impossible before. We can inspire someone five thousand miles away. The record label model is disintegrating. Democratization of media production and consumption has become the standard.” She picks at her sashimi a bit before going on, “I can take two iPads, stick them in my handbag, get on a plane, get off a plane in Russia and play a concert. As more and more developers take the platform seriously as an audio production tool, it’s only going to get bigger and bigger. I have done huge remixes for major recording artists, and I’m making my own music all the time. When people come to my show or listen to a song and it connects with them, that’s what matters. If someone later finds out it was made or performed on the iPad – who gives a hell?”

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