Reporting by Max Levin

A couple hours after I interviewed DJ Reach (click here to read), Joseph Godslaw ‘23 invited me to the Digital Design Studio for a chat about his time DJ-ing as Bunny Beanie while he was fresh off his opening set at WesRAVE.

How was WesRave?

Yeah, WesRave was amazing. I had a great time. That was my first time actually DJ-ing for a rave. I’ve DJ-ed for like a couple parties and events here and there, but that was actually a rave – so that was new territory for me, and I enjoyed it. It was great.

Like your biggest event by a landslide, or something?

Let me see, let me see, let me see. ‘Cause I DJ for Eclectic, ‘cause I’m part of Eclectic. I do events there, and I’ve DJ-ed there. I don’t know. The crowd might be similar, or the rave might have a bigger crowd. I don’t know.

The rave had a lot more promo behind it. Months of promo and a whole [marketing campaign with visuals] and everything. But that’s good to hear. I was talking with DJ Reach earlier, and he was very happy with how that turned out as well. He felt like a guest of honor, almost. Did you talk with him any time before the rave? How was he?

Yeah, he’s odd, ‘cause he was in his element, I didn’t wanna interfere– you know, get in his way, so I let him just do his thing. But he’s very generous and very, very welcoming. You know, after my set he came over to me and was like, “You did amazing, man. You did so great!” and dapped me up. I felt so welcome. Even before my set he gave me water. I never thought about that. I got really thirsty mid-set, and I was like, Wow, this came in handy! So, he’s so nice.

So, how did you start out with DJ-ing? When did that start for you?

It was junior year, actually, ‘cause I’m a senior now. I started early 2021. I’ve always loved DJ-ing, been into DJ-ing, but I had not practically started it ‘cause I thought it was gonna be difficult. But a friend of mine had a controller, a DJ set, and I saw them use it and asked them to teach me. So I just got into it.

[A] DJ for me is a professional playlist-maker. You’re making the playlist for the crowd. You’re curating an experience for the crowd through songs. So it’s not as difficult as people might think it is. You’re just curating a live playlist for the crowd so they enjoy it. That was pretty much how I saw it, and that’s how I approach making a set. I’m curating a live experience for the– I can be very on the spot. I can tweak the playlist, but in the broader view of things, you’re curating an experience through songs for the viewers. So that’s how I approach it; they enjoy it.

Yeah, just like paying attention to and influencing the social dynamic that you’re creating. That’s pretty much essential.

Yeah, right, yeah. Pretty much.

So, where did the name Bunny Beanie come from?

When I first started DJ-ing, I used to wear my signature hat: bunny beanie. I wore that every day. I still have it, but I don’t know why I didn’t wear it yesterday. I feel like I grew out of it… But when I started DJ-ing, that was the hat I wore every time. So when I was getting small gigs, I couldn’t think of a name. I didn’t want to use my name ‘cause I didn’t want to be self-centered, so I said, y’know what? “Bunny Beanie Hat”. It was initially Bunny Beanie Hat. Then I took the “Hat” away to just make it Bunny Beanie; BB to be more funny.

Yeah, like the alliteration and also the flow of the name, Bunny Beanie; it’s a much punchier title.

Exactly, yeah, and ever since then, that’s been the name. I don’t know if I want to change it later on if this is a direction that I might take. If this is something I might pursue after college or something, I might run with this name; I might change it, but for now I’m very comfortable with it: Bunny Beanie.

If you end up changing your title, it’ll come naturally.

Yeah, exactly.

So, like you said, you’re a senior. How has Wesleyan treated you during your time here? Do you have any thoughts for your last semester and how things have transpired for you, if that makes any sense?

Yeah, yeah. It’s been a great experience being here at Wesleyan. Wesleyan’s really shaped– I feel like I found myself at Wesleyan. Wesleyan shaped my belief system, my creative endeavors. I found myself here. And, you know, things that I’ve always been interested in, I put them into practice here. Like I really got deep in my art, in photography, video-making ‘cause I’m a film major, DJ-ing. I started really hands-on, being practical with things I’ve always loved, but been shy or been afraid to do. But, you know, there’s this welcoming environment here at Wesleyan that allows you to just cultivate your interests and work on them.

Yeah, just like approaching the spirit of creation through multiple different forms.

Right, right.

Circling back to DJ-ing, how do you assemble a mix? How do you find new music, stuff to put in rotation, all that?

People know me– I’m always in my headphones, so I’m always on the hunt for new music. I have a catalog of music. If I like it, I save it. So that’s how I curate my playlist. I save my songs that I listen to so when it’s time for DJ-ing, I just pull them out from songs that I know from the past and from the future, and I go through other people’s playlists. I follow a bunch of DJs that I admire, and I go through their playlists, I see what they’re doing, how they curate a playlist. I will take some inspiration from them, take some from mine. Before now, playlists became the mixes. I’m not gonna say it’s too easy, but it’s been fairly easy – not, okay, it’s not being too easy, but it is being – I had a good time doing it. But for the rave, it took me time to do it. For this rave show it took me time to curate a playlist because for different people, rave means different things, and some people are into techno, house, rave and some [are] into acid-techno, just hard techno; and some are into EDM, rave. So rave means different things for different people.

Yeah, it’s definitely a term that evolved over the decades.

Yeah!

It’s not just a thing [where] people would go to empty warehouses and dance their hearts out until the early hours of the morning. It definitely has evolved.

Yeah, it has evolved, and that kind of influenced my set list ‘cause I’m thinking of every person’s different perspective of rave. I’m thinking of them. How am I going to include all those different perspectives ‘cause, you know, this is new to Wesleyan, and this is the first time some of them might know rave. Some of them might already know rave. I’m trying to create a playlist that satisfies everyone’s interests, so I started with the hard trap, hard rave, acid rave then I transitioned to techno rave, then transitioned to techno house; just the whole, really, what I think rave is, the whole perspective of rave. I was transitioning. That’s how I curated my playlist. I just curated and transitioned from the hard to soft, and that’s how I ended it.

Yeah, that’s a good way of doing it for sure. That was most of what I had in mind in terms of [questions] – is there anything else you’d like to add?

No, pretty much whatever you have, that’s what I’ve got. This was great.

Transcribed by Maisie Wrubel ‘26, with edits by Max. RAVE photos taken by Kseniia Guliaeva ‘25.

Thanks to Joseph for this great conversation (and for the header photo), and thanks again to Adin Dowling ‘25 for bringing us in contact.