James Lavelle
English musician (1974)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
James Lavelle (born 22 February 1974)[1] is an English electronic musician, record label owner and curator. He founded the Mo'Wax record label in 1992, and has been the only constant member of Unkle.
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- DJ
- musician
- record producer
- songwriter
Career
Lavelle was born and grew up in Oxford.[1] He ran a club night in Oxford called Mo Wax Please while working at Bluebird record store in London.[2] He later moved to London and worked for Honest Jon's and contributed a column to Straight No Chaser.[2]
He founded his own record label Mo' Wax in 1992. The label was not co-founded by Tim Goldsworthy,[3] as is often reported.[4] Mo' Wax released albums by DJ Shadow, Dr. Octagon, and Lavelle's own Unkle project.[5]
Lavelle is a longtime resident at Fabric in London, mixing the inaugural Fabric Live mix album.[6] He has also mixed four DJ mix albums for Global Underground,[7] and soundtracks to the films Sexy Beast[8] and Shelter,[9] and TV series Trust.[10] Lavelle also produced the title track for Queens of the Stone Age's 2013 album ...Like Clockwork.[11]
In 2014 he was asked to direct the Meltdown festival, following in the footsteps of David Bowie, Yoko Ono, and Jarvis Cocker.[12] His lineup included concerts by Josh Homme, Max Richter, Neneh Cherry, Goldie and Mark Lanegan.[13] The event culminated with a live UNKLE:Redux featuring a guest appearance from former member DJ Shadow.[citation needed]
Lavelle later curated the 2016 exhibition "Daydreaming with Stanley Kubrick" at Somerset House.[14] He was the subject of 2016 documentary film The Man from Mo'Wax.[15]
Selected discography
UNKLE
- Psyence Fiction (1998)
- Never, Never, Land (2003)
- War Stories (2007)
- Where Did the Night Fall (2010)
- The Road: Part I (2017)
- The Road: Part II (Lost Highway) (2019)
Mix albums
- Cream Live Two – Disc 3 (1996)
- Tribal Gathering 96 – Disc 3 (1998)
- FabricLive.01 (2001)
- GU023 Global Underground, Barcelona (2002)
- Do Androids Dream of Electric Beats? (2001)
- Do Androids Dream of Essential Beats? (2003)
- GU026 Global Underground, Romania (2004)
- GU037 Global Underground, Bangkok (2009)
- GU041 Global Underground, Naples (2015)
Quotes
- "I became a DJ because I couldn't breakdance and I was no good at graffiti."[15]
- "I'm into a whole concept, it's a whole scene. I'm totally involved in it. We cover hip-hop fused music. We want to do this rock hip-hop thing. We are gonna launch a mad hip-hop/thrash fused band, a young Beastie Boys kind of thing. I'm into the total energy of the Beasties and that whole kind of skate thing. I want that energy and total madness surrounding the whole idea."[16]
- On Mo' Wax: "We put out 200 records in 4 or 5 years, I don’t think I’d ever be able to do that again. I don’t think I could ever work like that again, it was just insane."[17]