Paul Oakenfold Nov. 26th @ Avalon!

[avalonboston1]

London, UK

www.pauloakenfold.com

www.perfecto-fc.co.uk

Biography

He?s the one of the most consistently popular DJ?s in the country, and one of the very biggest on the planet. He?s widely believed to be responsible for kick-starting at least three major dance music movements over the last thirteen years. His remixes can double sales and guarantee radio and club play for those lucky few he accepts. He?s friends with the stars, flies first class and travels by chauffeur-driven limo, but he still believes in such hippyish ideas as ?karma? and ?positivity?. In fact, it?s hard to think of anything that Paul Oakenfold has yet to accomplish in dance music.

Born in Mile End, Paul grew up in North London and studied French cookery at college, although he always wanted to be in the music business. Whilst working through a succession of jobs ? men?s outfitters, barman, chef ? he applied to all the record companies, but got nowhere, so he packed his bags and headed off to live in New York at the turn of the 80s, recognizing the city as the global center of dance music at the time. He got a job as a courier in Manhattan and made a point of putting his face around the Big Apple?s record labels and clubs, including the legendary Paradise Garage.

Returning to London, Oakenfold landed a job as an A&R for Champion Records and signed Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince (aka Will Smith). His first ?remix? was a rearrangement of their Girls Ain?t Nothing But Trouble track, which went top ten. He became the frontman for Def Jam?s UK operations and also worked for Profile Records.

In 1984, Oakenfold holidayed in Ibiza and the following year he launched his first club night, Funhouse, an attempt to bring the Ibiza spirit back to the UK. It didn?t work, but Paul continued to spend his annual holidays on the White Island and in 1987 he, Danny Rampling, Johnny Walker and Nicky Holloway encountered ecstasy and Balearic house for the first time. He?d started another club night, The Project, based around hip-hop and soul, the year before and began to hold Balearic sessions there after the regular night finished.

Then he launched Spectrum at London?s Heaven club (later the venue for Rage) on Monday nights. For five weeks the night lost money, then suddenly went nuclear and became, alongside Shoom and The Trip, one of the key acid house nights of the time, as did its successors, Land Of Oz and Future, also pioneering the concept of chill-out with people like Alex Paterson (The Orb) and The KLF on board.

As a result of this success, Oakenfold soon became one of the best-known DJs in the country. Happy Mondays were regular visitors to Spectrum and approached Oakenfold to remix their Wrote For Luck single. The resulting record became the defining indie-dance record of the age, so the Mondays invited Paul and his studio collaborator Steve Osbourne to produce their Pills, Thrills & Bellyaches album which became a platinum-seller and was nominated for a Brit award. He also began his career as a support DJ for bands by warming up for The Stone Roses at Alexandra Palace and Spike Island.

Eventually rebelling against the rave movement ? too noisy and cheesy, not enough songs ? he launched the short-lived Movement 98 outfit, best known for their Joy And Heartbreak release, then moved into rock production with ? ahem - Deacon Blue, which earned him a Grammy nomination for his trouble. Over the next couple of years, he consolidated his position as one of the top remixers around with hit versions of tracks like The Shamen?s Move Any Mountain, Massive Attack?s Unfinished Sympathy, Arrested Development?s Mr Wendell and, crucially, U2?s Even Better Than The Real Thing, as well as launching his Perfecto label.

In 1993, Paul became U2?s warm-up DJ for the marathon Zooropa world tour, playing to audiences of up to 90,000 all over the world, and scored another massive success with his remix of the groups? Lemon track.

Then, like Danny Rampling, Paul visited Goa where he discovered trance and beach parties. To Paul, this was exactly the same spirit he had encountered in Ibiza seven years before and he threw himself wholeheartedly into the Goa trance scene and sound. He moved Perfecto up a gear and began to concentrate on his own trance-based productions, often including a Goa mix on the B side. His groundbreaking mid-nineties Goa mix for Radio 1?s Essential Selection, which blended film soundtracks and trance in the mix, was hailed as a milestone and served as an emphatic statement of intent. He had found the sound which, over the next five years, he was to make his own.

For the next couple of years Paul juggled increasing success with Perfecto with production and DJing all over the world. In 1996, looking for another challenge, he took a up a weekly residency at Cream ? an unheard of move for a top flight UK DJ at the time ? playing three hours in the Annexe room every Saturday night for the best part of the next two years. Oakenfold?s sets became legendary and the relationship he built with the crowd allowed him to take chances few other DJs could afford to risk, like mixing in his beloved film scores and using periods of silence to build up the tension.

Oakenfold?s Cream sets were vital in establishing trance in mainstream UK clubbing and nowadays the effects can be felt everywhere.

Trance rules the clubs of Britain and Ibiza and artists that Oakenfold signed to Perfecto, like BT and Man With No Name, have become stars. Paul has become a regular guest on Radio 1 and now has his own syndicated show on Galaxy FM. His Perfecto label is a market leader and Paul?s own productions, like Grace?s It?s Not Over, have become club anthems worldwide. Part idealistic hippy, part hard-nosed businessman, Paul Oakenfold has left an indelible mark on dance music.