Jamez

Dutch producer Jamez has had a hand in more good records than most of us have had hot dinners. Apart from the by-no-means trifling matter of co-producing house record – 51 Days’ ‘Paper Moon’ – he’s also been at the birth of the Trancesetters, the splendidly-named Tata Box Inhibitors, P.I.M.P., Loophole, Amfibian, Mindfunk and an ever-expanding list of inventively-spelt production credits. You’d wonder, looking at the fellow’s discography, whether he ever got any kip (we’ve been assured by his family that he does).

Jamez, for those that haven’t been paying attention, was part of a Dutch triumvirate – the other two being Dobre and DJ Zki – that helped transform European house music in the early 90s. Working closely with Dutch outfit Touché Records, they produced a series of consistently great singles of wildly differing styles ranging from the jazzy (Jamshed), deep (51 Days) and the acclaimed harder style of Tata Box Inhibitors and Trancesetters. While most UK DJ’s looked to the US for new records, oddly, lots of American DJs – Danny Tenaglia being a particular fan – championed this new European style (Underworld’s Darren Emerson was also an early supporter of Touché’s releases).

Like many a young European, Jamez was turned on to dance music via the burgeoning rap scene of the eighties, before hooking up with Dobre who, as luck would have it, had a small home-studio. Experiments in dance ensued. A meeting with DJ Zki at a radio station completed the Three Musketeers’ line-up. Early releases came out through fellow countryman Robin ‘Jaydee’ Albers’ First Impressions label, but it was through Touché Records – started with Dobre – that Jamez and his cohorts gained international recognition.

Both 51 Days’ mournful ‘Paper Moon’ and Trancesetters’ heavy-hitting ‘The Search’ were massive New York club hits. Plenty of others were staples in DJs’ boxes around the world, probably because Jamez has mastered the art of syncopated and punchy beats, mellifluous keyboards and catchy hooks. Soulful dance music, in other words. As a remixer, Jamez is no slouch, either, having turned in superb mixes of Paperclip People’s ‘The Climax’, X-Press 2′s strident ‘The Sound’, Humate’s ‘Choose Life’ and a stunning rerub of Der Dritte Raum’s ‘Alienoid’, transforming it into a hypnotically textural house cut. The list goes on and on.

After more than 100 releases on world class labels, numerous remixes and many appearances on compilations, he definetly put his mark down. As a DJ he also did his part. Flying from one city to the other, keeping the crowds shouting for more. His mix of techno and tech house takes the listener on a journey through unknown territories, well known hights and deep smooth plains.

After a well-deserved sabbatical Jamez returned to the scene in 2008, where he hooked up with Soulboy. In the summer of 2009 Christian Smith (Smith & Selway) did a remix for Trancesetters ‘The Search’. The track had big support from Hernan Cattaneo, James Zabiela, John Digweed and Adam Beyer. Together with Soulboy, they produced the track Surface Tension, which was in 2009 Kevin Saunderson’s summers favourite and was frequently heard on Ibiza Global Radio.

In 2011 he launched together with Abdelilah Amraoui and Gwendoline van Gulijk a new recordlabel “Repressure Recordings”.He believes that good music has no limit, that artists must be able to make and release quality music.