ArtistInfo

Jay Kaufman

Dance

When it comes to electronic music, Jay Kaufman has lived it for most of his life. Buying records before he paid rent and staying up two days straight to finish that essential tune for a gig haven’t been uncommon occurrences over the years. Jay’s bio spans twenty-plus years of DJing in dark rooms with bright lights. Fifteen or so of those years have been spent developing a hardened and very pale studio tan. So it goes. Jay’s early days were spent in his bedroom trying to paste together ‘pause tapes’ of new wave bands he heard on late night Toronto radio. This was an old school technique where he’d remix tracks on the spot using a dual cassette tape deck. Soon, he found himself with the largest record collection in his Grade 6 class and was DJing his primary school's dances not long thereafter. That would all change with the rise of house and techno music in the 1980s from the close-by cities of Detroit, Chicago and New York. By all accounts Jay was a strange kid. By the age of 13, Jay had amassed a record collection envious of the most avid adult collector. In 1987, he heard house music for the first time on the radio and it all changed. Early acid house classics like A Guy Called Gerald’s ‘Voodoo Ray’ and LNR’s ‘Work It To The Bone’ laid down an addiction that has never been relinquished. A pair of belt-driven turntables soon followed with proper Technics decks shortly thereafter. A career path in music was born and Jay’s future as a DJ was cemented. His early days were spent honing his skills on the job at the various events he helped throw in his native Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario, Canada area. Dodgy raves held in loft and empty warehouse spaces, free parties down by a local river, house parties, club nights and even the odd cheesy top 40 nightclub or wedding gig all factor into Jay’s early resume. As Jay became more involved with the thriving rave scene in the K-W, Toronto and Canadian scene as a whole, his distaste for the mainstream music scene grew. In turn, this saw him rising up through the ranks from a local DJ to a DJ/producer with a more global outlook and reach. His love of music saw him soon learning the ropes of music production at a time when computers and the Internet were in their infancy and analogue outboard gear reigned supreme. 303s, 101s, Alpha-Juno-1s, MIDI, DAWs and many other acronyms and names for all things bleepy and geek became a part of his artistic-make up. Jay’s tracks have been released in the form of vinyl, CD, mp3 and other multimedia streams. Placement has come in the form of movies like ‘Rolling’ (2008), licenses to DJ mix compilations like UK-charting ‘Slinky Trans:Atlantik’ (2004), and even oddities like a Japanese soft-porn DVD. His productions have had airings from many of the better-known DJ glitterati. Signings and remixes for labels like Sonambulist Recordings (UK), Bellarine Recordings (Australia), L2 Music (Germany), Park Limited Muzik (Japan), Unrivaled Music (UK), Endemic Digital (UK), Stripped Digital (UK), Fullbodysoundsystem (Canada) and even his own Tortoise Shell Recordings (Canada) have helped attain a rising global recognition for Jay’s music production skills. Somewhere in the midst of this mess, Jay has managed to write for several music publications, A&R for labels, write press releases for record labels, hold down a 3-year residency at a club he ran/promoted and host a FM radio show for around the same time. His DJ mixes have aired as a featured artist all over the radio dial in places like Canada, Panama, Northern Ireland, Russia, Peru, France, Argentina, Mexico, Australia, Aruba and on various Internet radio stations and blogs. That’s all old news though. After a hiatus from DJing, Jay Kaufman is back on the decks (or rather, a laptop and MIDI controllers). His production has started back up as well and you should be able to find his music through all good digital download retailers like Beatport, iTunes, Amazon and many others. The time is now. The soundtrack to it is Jay Kaufman. To book Jay Kaufman, please contact bookings at jaykaufman.ca