Top DJ Vik-T trades his mane for help for cancer patients

Top DJ Vik-T trades his mane for help for cancer patients

After his mother's death, the DJ launches a solidarity campaign for the AECC Balearic Islands

On Passeig Mallorca, where cafés fill the curb in the mornings and the first scooters roar again toward the harbour, a familiar face from the scene has been occupying the neighbourhood in recent days: Víctor Torres, known to many simply as Vik-T. Instead of records or new gigs, something else is at the centre of his attention right now: a fundraising campaign for cancer patients and their relatives in the Balearic Islands.

The campaign is straightforward and therefore effective: Vik-T has announced that he will part with his long hair—his visual trademark for more than 15 years—if €3,000 is raised for the Balearic delegation of the Asociación Española Contra el Cáncer (AECC) by May 6. The reasons are personal. His mother lost the fight against a brain tumour about a year ago, after battling the disease for more than a year. During that difficult time, the family received support from the AECC, he explains; psychological support and practical aids like a wheelchair or a care bed made everyday life easier.

That a music professional sacrifices his signature look sounds like a show, but it is more: for many people in Palma's bars and clubs, Vik-T is someone from the neighbourhood, not just a name on a flyer. That keeps the campaign grounded and relatable. By May 4, the campaign reported around €845 raised through 33 individual donations. The DJ announced he would extend the campaign to collect more money; he also stresses that he will cut his hair anyway—regardless of the final amount raised. Other local artists have also prioritised family and care, such as Antonja cancelling her Mallorca shows to accompany her seriously ill father.

The collected funds are intended to benefit the AECC Balearic Islands for psychological care, accompaniment of patients and their families, and for research projects. This is not a dusty technical field: psychological help and practical support are often what makes the difference in a crisis, when hospital stays, transport and care situations disrupt a family's daily life. Hospitals are also exploring supportive measures for patients, for instance virtual reality headsets being trialled at Hospital d'Inca during chemotherapy.

On the island, such an appeal does more than raise money: it reminds people that cancer happens in the middle of life. Strolling through Santa Catalina or the Mercat de l'Olivar on a Sunday afternoon, you meet people who have lived through an illness or lost someone. Those stories are not an abstract topic for the arts pages; they are part of everyday life. A local DJ using his reach for such causes creates visibility and sparks conversations—at the bar, in the hairdresser's, in the doctor's waiting room. Similar gestures can be seen elsewhere on Mallorca, for example when a cardiologist swam from Menorca to Cala Mesquida to raise awareness about cancer.

The mood around the campaign is marked by personal closeness. On a small cultural island like Palma, gestures of this kind are contagious: neighbours, club owners, regulars and strangers donate small amounts that add up. The approach is pragmatic and humane at once. The combination of personal loss, a publicly visible act of self-sacrifice (the hair) and a concrete recipient (AECC Balearic Islands) makes the campaign understandable and easy to share.

For Mallorca, this is a small but fine piece of news: solidarity here remains not a phrase but an action. If you walk Palma's streets in the coming days, alongside the street noise you might also hear the memory of a lost life and the quiet wish to turn it into something meaningful. When people who create the atmosphere in clubs use their notoriety to help, a network forms that reaches far beyond the DJ scene.

If you're curious now, you can find information on the platform hosting the campaign and support the AECC's work on the Balearic Islands with a contribution. Whether it's €5 from a neighbour or larger sums: every gesture helps strengthen psychological services, accompaniment and research work.

Outlook: whether the €3,000 goal will be reached by the set date remains open. What already matters, however, is the signal—a musician trading his image for help and thereby starting a conversation about illness, care and closeness. In Palma, this may inspire imitation: small initiatives that together achieve something big.

A brief, personal afterword: on the walk home in the evening, when the city lights shimmer and a few tones linger in the bars, it is often precisely that mixture of melancholy and drive that shapes everyday life on the island. Vik-T has proposed a way to turn both into something useful—and many will follow him.