Jay Denham tickets and 2024 tour dates

Biography

Jay DENHAM is the second generation Detroit techno pioneer - musician, dj artist and producer from Kalamazoo, Michigan - city right in the middle between Chicago and Detroit. His style is a unique blend of these two worlds - Chicago house and Detroit techno, with a Kalamazoo touch. He stays true to the underground, makes the music for the art of it and always remembers where he comes from.

Denham's solid musical background takes its roots in 70s, when little Jay opted for a four-string bass guitar over a six-string electric. By age 17, Jay has been playing high school party gigs with his rock band.

During these teenage years, he developed a taste for punk and New Wave, though still influenced by funk acts like Rick James, Parliament, Cameo, Zapp, and later Prince and The Time, as well as by electronic music of Kraftwerk.

With the arrival of the 80s, Jay Denham moved on to the early Detroit techno and further on to the Chicago house, when he

came across "Chicago Hot Mix" tapes and the revolutionary Farley Jackmaster Funk and the deep Frankie Knuckles. Immediately blown away by these new sounds, Jay started his pilgrimages to the Cradle of House music in search of records, religiously tape-recording the local radio shows he couldn't receive in his home town, Kalamazoo. A chance encounter with the legendary early House producer, Chip E inspired Jay to try to make this new music himself, and eventually to create his own sound.

The next significant encounter marked another step in Jay's career. At the Western Michigan University he befriended a certain Anthony Shakir, aka DJ Shake, who now runs Frictional records. Shake had a keyboard, Jay had a drum machine and it wasn't long before they were jamming together. Finally a breakthrough - full dedication, hard working and sacrifices paid off - Denham's early works captured the attention of Derrick May and Kevin Saunderson who released Jay's first EPs on Transmat off-shoot label Fragile and KMS label. The track "Rituals", which Jay released as Vice on the Techno 2 Next Generation album, was quickly followed by the classic track "In'Sync", released as Fade II Black.