If you thought you knew Ultra Naté, think again.

Sure, you're familiar with her arsenal of club hits:"Free,"“Found a Cure,"and her most recent back-to-back #1s"Automatic"and"Give it All You Got,"to name a few. Hell, those classics are the reason we named her DIVA OF THE MONTH for APRIL '07, back when she was releasing her latest album Grime, Silk & Thunder.

But believe it or not, this fierce phenomenon still has a few tricks up her sleeveless dress: she's a DJ, too, and she's grown comfortable enough behind the decks – as well as behind the microphone – that she is releasing her first commercially released DJ mix… and as a result, becoming the first female artist on to receive our DIVA crown for the second time.

"DJing has always been seen as a boys club kind of art,"says Ultra, who releases her double-disc album Alchemy / G. S. T. Reloaded on August 19; disc one contains previously unreleased remixes of the hits and album tracks from last year's Grime, Silk & Thunder, while disc two puts Ultra in charge of a non-stop DJ set featuring even more unseen remixes of her best work. She's excited to be showing this side of her musical passion.

"Now many women are finding it [DJ] an exciting challenge, instead of intimidating as it may have once been,"says Ultra. "I also think the audience is more open and receptive to a female DJ than they may have once been."

There's little doubt about that. While some mixing mistresses like DJ Rap and Colette have been behind the booth for years, it's a pretty major milestone for an artist known for years as a major vocal house diva to make so smooth a transition into adding the DJ moniker to her craft. But Ultra says she was absorbing the influence of local DJs even while growing up in the club scene of Baltimore, Maryland.

"You've probably never heard of them, but they are not a game!"she adds of those early introductions to the world of DJing. As her career progressed, she began receiving an education in the art of spinning from legends any dance fan would recognize: Tony Humphries, Timmy Regisford, Louie Vega, David Morales and Frankie Knuckles.

But Ultra really started adding lines to her own DJ resume through the creation of her own club night – SUGAR – back in her native Baltimore. Besides helping her cut her teeth on vinyl for the past five years, it's fulfilled her"Desire"to help music bring the people together.

"I remember the first time I walked into a club… how I felt and how it changed the course of my life,"she says."I want to be able to possibly provide that same situation and have that kind of effect on someone else: where they walk in there, and they feel such liberation and freedom that they can dance with total abandon. They might be dancing next to a white gay person, or a white straight person, an old person, a young kid… whomever. SUGAR is a complete melting pot. On any given night there's representation of any kind of person."

And at the heart of it has been Ultra, honing her craft until she felt ready to show it the world at large.

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