Miami Living Magazine

DJ Ashba

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EXCLUSIVE MIAMI LIVING 101 MORE ABOUT DJ Do you ever find yourself just sitting around not doing anything? Watching TV? Or are you always working on something? "I do. I do." He laughs. "My wife has been really good about making me stop and smell the roses. I'm such a workaholic, it's just in my blood and I love it. My sister and brother are the same way, so it's like the three of us, we're all alike. We'll work as long as it takes." What do you think fans would be surprised to find out about you? "I love camping (laughs)… I've become an EBay addict. They know more about me than I do. I actually go online just to learn about me. I'm like, Holy shit, really? Every picture I post, I go on my Facebook and find a cool one that they posted… I went on there and there's this whole photo shoot I did with no shirt and I was like, Ohmygod, I wish I had never done that." You like crows, is there any significance to them? "My dad left when I was 4, I had a real shit childhood. Everywhere I went as a kid there would be a crow. I know this sounds crazy, but it was very comforting, like a guardian angel was following me. Obviously I found out later, it wasn't the same fucking crow (we laugh). It's always been one of those things where you have a shit day and you look up and there's a crow staring at you. Living on your own when you're 16, you don't really have friends, so you kind of make friends with a bird that doesn't talk to you," he laughs. "I've always had a killer guardian angel. I probably should've died a few times through life, so I gave the credit to the crows. It's kinda dumb, I know." Are you a spiritual person? "I am. I believe in God and I was raised in a very Christian family, but I don't feel like I need to go to church to believe in God. I don't need to go hang out with people I don't care about to get on my knees and pray. I do pray every day and I'm thankful for what I have. He's helped me through a lot of stuff. I just try to be good to everybody and do the best I can —probably failing miserably (laughs), but I'm trying." People dream of being a rock star —did you always think it was possible? "Absolutely! It was never a doubt in my mind. I just didn't know I was going to be in Guns N' Roses. I knew for sure that I would play music for a living, whether it was playing in a lounge band somewhere... I know construction, music and art, and that's it. Ever since I was 15 on top of that roof, even though it was all in my head, it felt so real. Here I am, many years later, playing in Guns N' Roses, one of the biggest rock bands in the world… I thought I was going to get the success when I was 23, but it took many, many years of hard, hard work. You get kicked to the ground many times over. I was just relentless." ML

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