Hunee: The Fearless German-Korean Selector Following a Hunch
The first time I saw Hunee playing live was last May at the Sandbox Festival in El Gouna, Red Sea, where he made his Egypt debut with a sparkling unprecedented set of skewed house and disco. It was way past midnight, around 2 AM, and though everyone had been partying since early noon, he managed to command the attention of every single person there, pulling a whole spectrum of moves on the dancefloor of the Sandbox stage with a kind of effortless flair that I had never seen before.
In an industry where most DJs tend to play it safe on big stages, sticking to the music that would get hands in the air, Hunee stands out as a fearless risk taker who never compromises his diverse selections, whether he is playing an intimate club night or a massive festival stage. He’s gutsy enough with a super eclectic taste to play classic tunes as well as adventurous records.
Born in Bochum, a former industrial town in West Germany, with a South Korean heritage, Hun Choi (AKA Hunee) found in music a practice to turn a lot of the otherness he felt growing up into something interesting and beautiful. His famous sets are as colourful as his personality and quite unpredictable, spanning continents and eras as a byproduct of his deep crates and sensitive research-based approach to dance music. His sounds dabble in a little bit of everything, from deep house and disco to vintage italo, electro and techno, all pulled from his personal record collection.
One of his most iconic moments came in 2017 during his Dekmatel b2b closing set alongside Antal, which he never pre-planned, yet the night produced viral videos in its wake, cementing him as a crowd favourite and one of the most likeable characters globally. His immense inspiration and wholly unique taste are personified in releases like ‘Rare Happiness’ and ‘Amo’, as well as a string of productions featured under esteemed record labels like ‘Rush Hour’.
Ahead of his gig at Boogie Box’s 15-year anniversary festival on the sandy shores of Al Fujairah Island in Abu Dhabi on November 2nd, I caught up with Hunee in a virtual sitdown, where he shares how it all started, his tips for digging, as well as how he finds the energy in the MENA region and his advice for budding DJs looking to carve their own path in the industry.