By Katerina Graziosi

Christopher Santos stands in the shed behind his Vallejo home. Only it doesn’t look like any old shed, it’s been outfitted with lights, turntables and recording equipment. It’s all part of the studio-slash-office space the DJ and content creator built out for himself during the pandemic when working from home posed various spatial and audio challenges. 

Behind him, a shelf displays a handful of records handpicked from the stacks more behind that. Among them is “Fantastic, Vol. 2” by Slum Village. It’s one of the LPs he reaches for often, having had an early influence on his musical style of hip-hop and R&B, which he fuses together through the tangible grooves of vinyls. 

“A lot of the stuff didn’t make it to digital, and so I’m really into discovering new things,” Santos says, describing his solo trips to the record store as a kind of meditation. “The ritual of finding records, reading the backs of them, looking at the covers — it’s almost like you’re exploring history as well.” 

A first-generation Filipino American, Santos grew up in Fairfield where his family home had a piano. He took the “mandatory” piano lessons that he says are impressed on most kids of Filipino descent (that or guitar lessons) and it was enough for the music to stick. He proceeded to play the drums in high school and, eventually, found his way to the turntables, first playing at family and friends’ parties. 

“I would consider myself a little bit introverted,” Santos says, “so when I found that I can do this in front of people — and it’s almost like a way to perform — it gave me a level of confidence that just allowed me to [say], ‘Oh, I found my place in a party,’ or ‘[I] come with my place in social settings.’” 

After high school, he attended Sacramento State where he got to exercise his newfound passion through the student-run radio station KSSU. Tapping into his knowledge of underground hip-hop and radio on either side of Fairfield, both in Sacramento and San Francisco, Santos was well positioned to take the airwaves as “DJ Flow.” 

After graduating with a degree in business administration, Santos went on to work in the digital marketing space, DJing as a side-gig through residencies around the Bay Area. When faced with the uncertainties brought about by the pandemic, Santos leaned into social media to market his passion — and it paid off. He currently has a following of over 230,000 across Instagram, TikTok and YouTube. 

And his reach has only grown from there. After DJing internationally in Japan and France and being inducted into the Mac Agency’s Vinyl Collective, a prestigious roster of industry DJs, 102.5 KSFM in Sacramento offered Santos a regular segment during the station’s Weekend Rewind, which debuted in February. 

“It’s pretty exciting to be able to do something that initially sparked the reason I DJ in the first place,” Santos says. “It’s another kind of badge, where I’m like ‘cool, I DJed on the radio.’” 

His blends can be heard on Saturdays and Sundays from 10 a.m. to noon, where he imbues his mixes with the same philosophy he brings to any set.

“Playing music for people, getting a reaction out of them … it’s like a human puzzle, where you’re put in this room with a bunch of people and you got to figure out how to program music to make them have a good time,” he says. “I’ve always attached to that. The challenge is always new.” 

This story is part of the Solving Sacramento journalism collaborative. Solving Sacramento is supported by funding from the James Irvine Foundation and the James B. McClatchy Foundation. Our partners include California Groundbreakers, Capital Public Radio, Outword, Russian America Media, Sacramento Business Journal, Sacramento News & Review, Sacramento Observer and Univision 19. Sign up for our monthly newsletter.