Local Selection 300: Holly Lester

We celebrate the landmark 300th Local Selection Mix with a juggernaut contribution from Belfast-based nightlife advocate, label owner, and one of the country’s pound-for-pound finest selectors, Holly Lester. As the boss of Duality Trax and co-owner of Terrazzo, Lester has long been at the beating heart of Belfast’s club culture. In a city that faces ongoing challenges in sustaining a healthy nightlife ecosystem, she has emerged as a commanding and essential presence. Through her relentless work as an artist, alongside her activism, she has played a pivotal role in raising awareness of the struggles and adversities facing the scene. In 2021, she co-founded Free The Night with Boyd Sleator, and together they have worked tirelessly to push for a better future for Northern Ireland’s nightlife. A regular fixture at Belfast’s AVA Festival, it was there she recorded her Boiler Room set in 2018, a breakthrough moment that saw DJ Mag and The Guardian cite her as a star on the rise. It was as a DJ that she first gained widespread recognition, becoming a staple at key institutions such as Shine, Chibuku Shake Shake, and The Warehouse Project. Since then, she has taken her sound across the globe, commanding dancefloors from Europe to Australia and Indonesia, with standout appearances in cities like Berlin, Amsterdam, and Prague. Holly marks the 300th Local Selection Mix as we move into Four Four Magazine’s 10-year celebrations, an apt choice of artist to helm such a watershed moment in the series. Mix 300 captures a DJ firmly at the top of her game and delivers exactly what you’d expect from Lester: deep, chugging, poignant and proggy, with flashes of jackin’ energy and soulful undertones. It’s a carefully curated cocktail of nuanced selections from a DJ who consistently digs deeper, cutting through an era where club culture can often lean on the obvious or overly familiar. Instead, Holly meets that tendency head-on with a heady, rolling selection rooted in house music as its backbone, steering the mix with intent, patience, and precision. The result is a journey that could soundtrack a sunset at Titanic Slipways or the first light of an Australian morning rave. But right now, it belongs here, marking number 300 in style. We’ll dance to that. Holly Lester ------------------ SC: @hollylester IG: www.instagram.com/holly__lester/ Four Four Magazine 
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