Today we are profiling our very own editor in chief, Katleho Mokhethi known as “Binnz” in the entertainment industry. In this feature you will get to know more about Katleho, from her childhood background to the woman she has become.

Katleho was born in Bloemfontein but she grew up in Ladybrand. Katleho started her schooling at Yeshua College Pre-school in Ladybrand, went on to Ladybrand Primary School and then came back to Bloemfontein to attend Brebner High School where she matriculated. After high school she went to the University of the Free State, obtaining a degree Communication Science specializing in Media Studies and Journalism.

While she was at the UFS, she was involved in several on campus student activities such as campus radio, hosting a daily lunchtime show on KovsieFM. While at KovsieFM, she also became a BlackBerry Social Media Guru for the Free State, as BlackBerry was making its transition from BIS to their smartphones.

In 2014 she went through a lot of difficulties and in the midst of all that Katleho left Bloemfontein to pursue her passion for music and sound at FUSE Academy, a female DJing school situated in Newtown Johannesburg. She describes 2014 as “the worst year” as things were not going well financially and psychologically, which resulted in her deciding to put her studies on hold and pursue her DJing career.

FUSE Academy is where Katleho learned the basics of deejaying. Although their main focus was house music at the academy, Katleho used what they taught her in house music, to implement in Hip Hop as that was and is the genre she prefers. When Katleho came back to Bloem, her friend Em-Jay, who happens to be a Hip-Hop DJ, taught her how to incorporate all the skills she learned at FUSE into hip-hop music. By the end of 2014 she was officially a DJ and her first set was at #FUSs, a premium Hip Hop event that was hosted monthly at Cubana Bloemfontein. “I remember being very scared, considering what a huge platform was for someone who had just started out. However, I was grateful to just be there and that they believed in me.”

As a DJ some of the biggest events she has been a part of include #FUSs, “that was a solid foundation for me, and it was one of the biggest events in Bloem while it was still going on” she said. She has also played a Pop Bottles Bloem for two consecutive years; she had only been playing for nine months when she got the opportunity. In 2017 Katleho played at Ms Cosmo’s Fun House, Bloem edition. In April 2018, she was named as the first female DJ to be included in the KosherFam line up, and is also the only female DJ included in the Picnic In The North line up, both very successful events in Bloem. She has been a resident DJ at Cubana and she is currently a resident DJ at Ivy Lounge.

When asked about the challenges she has faced in her career she answered “What women face everywhere. Being a woman in a man’s world, men tend to think they can get their way with you. I’ve had to deal with promoters who will contact you for a “booking” but want to discuss other nonrelated things. Other challenges would be people just not taking you seriously because you’re a women, but as I said, it’s something women face everyday.”

Katleho has aspirations of being a bigger brand and going beyond the boarders of the Free State and Africa and being an international female DJ.

Given that Katleho is female and most of her gigs are at night, it was a bit obvious that her parents would be worried especially about her safety. She explained that her mother has been supportive from the start even though they were disappointed that she had dropped out of UFS to go pursue deejaying. Her father did not like it as he did not understand what the whole deejaying thing entailed and how it was aligned to what she studied and her life goals.

Among the many hats she wears as editor of BloemGirlsRock, being a DJ and assisting in curation at DigitalShero, her most important role is that of a mother to her 1 and a half year old daughter. When asked how she balances everything she explained that it is not a struggle as she’s been afforded the privilege of working from home, allowing her to take care of her daughter in between her flexible working hours. “I’m grateful that during BloemGirlsRock, I have been able to work from home which has allowed me to raise my daughter, something that most mothers don’t get to do. Seeing every phase of her growth is something I will always thank the universe for”

Asked what makes her a girl that rocks she replied “I’m a girls girl. I’m for women getting their own paper, I’m for gender equality and I’m for women breaking barriers and shaking tables they were once not allowed to sit at. I guess I’m lowkey feminist ”