Eris Drew is a DJ, producer and trans ecstatic from Chicago. She runs the T4T LUV NRG recording label with her loving b2b partner Octo Octa from a log cabin in New Hampshire. Eris is a recording artist for her own label, Interdimensional T ransmissions (Detroit) and Naive Records (Lisbon). She conducts the Psychedelic Rites of the Motherbeat with her friends at Pittsburgh's Hot Mass and at Room 4 Resistance in Berlin.

Eris has been playing and programming keyboards since she was a child. A long-time resident at Chicago's Smart Bar and DJ for the Bunker NY, she started mixing records in 1994 at the age of 18. Her experiences as a musician and dancer showed her that rave is a powerful apparatus which can be used to transform individual lives and communities. In an effort to contextualize the rave experience, Eris gives talks around the world on the connections between dance music culture and other ecstatic traditions. In addition, she is an advocate for trans/non-binary/queer people and mentors aspiring DJs and electronic musicians.

When Eris was 18 she had an intensely disruptive spiritual awakening. House music cracked her open and revealed a mystery contained within sound. This “Motherbeat” —as she would call it—was first beheld by Eris following a rave in 1994 at Chicago’s Oak Street Theater. She has helped Eris to heal, create art and find her friends for over 23 years. Motherbeat is a fundamental primordial pulsation; a whispering geometric wind with the power to heal; the archetype of a goddess ascending.

She is there to remind us that:

I. Ritual dance music has been here since the beginning, before historical time.
II. Each of us is made for better things than the cultural download we receive provides.
III. We can use music as a technology to unlock our bodies, dissolve boundaries and models, and find each other.

Dance music has often romanticized the idea of the anonymous artist who quietly lurks in the shadows, but Octo Octa (a.k.a. Maya Bouldry-Morrison) has no interest in hiding who she is. She's an openly autobiographical artist, and one who's eager to tell her story as a radical queer trans woman polyamorous witch.

The New Hampshire-based DJ, producer and live performer has been active for nearly a decade, but in recent years she's leveled up, fueled by the rising tide of North America's queer DJ scene, not to mention the success of her albums Where Are We Going? (2017) and Resonant Body (2019). Though her music has appeared on labels such as Naive, Honey Soundsystem, T echnicolour and 100% Silk, Resonant Body was released on T4T LUV NRG, a label she runs alongside her romantic and DJ partner Eris Drew. The two can often be found going back-to-back in the booth, and together they've created a platform that actively celebrates trans love and visibility, along with the potent healing magic of the dancefloor.

House, techno and breakbeat are Octo Octa's genres of choice, although these kinds of descriptors ultimately feel a bit clinical given the intensely personal nature of her music. Gravitating toward the ecstatic, the joyful and the openly emotional, it's no wonder that Bouldy-Morrison's uniquely uplifting vision has been enthusiastically welcomed on dancefloors around the globe, including those at world-renowned festivals like Sónar, Dekmantel and Sustain Release.

While her path—especially outside the club—has often been (and continues to be) challenging, it's in dance music that Octo Octa has found connection, self-realization and true love. She's got a story to tell, and it's powerful.