Alok: human after all
“Hi, love. I’m in the middle of an interview — can I call you back straight after?” Alok says gently to his wife, Romana Novais. It’s a quiet reminder of what keeps him grounded amid the whirlwind of global fame: family. The moment, tender and private, unfolds in near silence — only minutes before he recalls his father’s birthday. “What a unique man,” he says, his voice softening.
It’s just past midday in Los Angeles. Alok is sitting on the sofa of his apartment, where the city’s blue, cloudless sky stretches out beyond the window. He only arrived the previous night, fresh from a 12-day sprint that took him across Miami, Las Vegas, Brazil, and China. The City of Angels is, for now, his makeshift base before the European summer tour begins. “I’ve done so much in the past month,” he says. “Coachella, then Chicago, Mexico, Brazil, China again, then Las Vegas, Miami…” His next stops? Bali, Taiwan, and back to Brazil — just in time for the country’s traditional Festas Juninas, which light up towns from the south to the north. Especially in the north-east, where he’s expected to play for millions. After that, a three-month run across Europe, with stops at Untold and Tomorrowland and Tomorrowland Brasil — he’s now the event ambassador in Brazil for the megafest.
Alok’s manner is calm, his words unhurried. They reveal something essential — the human beneath the machine of touring, technology, and spectacle. And it’s in this space that a central tension emerges: between intimacy and performance, ancestry and future. Alok doesn’t hide his concern with the dystopian landscapes of cultural industry and the unchecked rise of artificial intelligence — his Keep Art Human project is a critique of AI automation in creativity. He makes his position clear from the outset.
“Art is one of the most powerful forms of cultural expression,” he believes. “But when it paints a future where technology separates us from our humanity and our roots, it begins to shape our collective imagination. Keep Art Human is a counter-manifesto. It’s a reminder of the value of human creation, and our connection with the planet, while embracing technology in ways that enhance rather than replace.” This narrative — part warning, part vision — comes from a restless spirit. A man shaped by counterculture, steeped in dance and spirituality, raised in one of the most iconic festivals in the world — Universo Paralello — by a family of DJs, as his very name suggests (Alok means light, brightness). Music runs in his blood.
