Page 72 - Fyne Times Spring 2014

Annie Mac – DJ
Annie comes from a musical family;
one of her brothers is a folk musician
while the other is the lead singer
of an Indy band. Her love of club
music started at university in Belfast
and she invested in a set of decks
to give it a try herself. At the same
time she started cultivating a radio
DJ career when she volunteered for
student radio. Via a few well-chosen
career steps she ended up working as
an assistant for Steve Lamacq and
Zane Lowe. Her voice was first heard
on the radio in an ident for Mike
Davies punk show, simply because
the producer liked the way ‘punk’
sounded with her thick Irish accent.
She later gained her own dance
music show, Annie Mac Presents.
Hearing she was also a pretty good
club DJ, the famous dance music
club Fabric asked her to perform a
regular night in one of their rooms.
Today, she performs around the world
at festivals and club nights and has
become a definitive brand in the club
and dance music scene.
Natalie Randolph –
American Football Coach
Sport in America is very gender
divided. Boys play football, basketball
and hockey while the girls…well,
the girls cheerlead. But things are
slowly starting to improve and the
female leagues for traditionally male-
dominated sports are gaining more and
more popularity. Natalie Randolph
was a promising athlete at school and
after college played professional female
football as a wide receiver. Her career
lasted from 2003-2008. Her career
as a coach started at H.D. Woodson
High School but in 2007 she beat off
competition from an NFL player and
a former army officer to get the job as
head coach at Coolidge High School.
Her focus on academia as well as sport
was what won her the job as the school
was failing to get many players into
top college sides due to their lack of
academic achievement. To begin with,
the team found it hard to get a game
as no local team wanted to be the first
to be ‘beaten by the girl coach’. She
has also described how her players
‘tested’ her by asking questions about
the rules of football. However, she has
now settled into the role and the team
is doing well both academically and on
the football pitch.
SPRING 2014
72