Carla Legaspi has been DJing in Las Vegas for almost a decade. Better known as DJ C-L.A., she’s one of the many locals who cut her teeth in the scene before electronic dance music exploded on the Strip. “I was here when the locals were the superstars,” she says. “And [they] kind of got pushed aside through the EDM movement.”
Now, she’s predicting a return to the golden age. “There are so many great DJs who have seen the scene grow—it’s like a rebirth. Just like fashion, everything comes back around, and the locals are coming up again.”
As for her initial foray into DJing, C-L.A. cut her teeth in LA nearly 15 years ago, spinning at weddings and corporate events during her last year of college. “I just did that on the side, and after I graduated, I moved to Las Vegas. [It wasn’t] until I met my friends who were DJs already that I was like, oh wow, I can be a DJ.”
Now she’s one of Tao’s longest-running residents, and she’s no stranger to playing all over the U.S. and beyond. “I used to go to the Bahamas once a month,” she says. “The exposure in Vegas is so huge and prevalent, because there are people who come from all over.” And most of the time, she says, “they’ve never seen a female who can play.”
She brings some of that nightlife flavor to her latest residency at Crazy Horse III, adapting it for a gentlemen’s club. “In the nightclub you’re a puppet master of the dancefloor—you’re creating a vibe, and people are there to dance and pop bottles and celebrate.” Inside Crazy Horse III, she keeps things hip-hop-focused, dropping tracks from Drake, Future, Meek Mill and Gucci Mane. “I provide that club vibe, and the dancers love it because it’s different. I see them, and I know that they’re feeling the song that I’m playing.”
