Green Velvet
Name: Green Velvet
Country:
Music Genres: Techno,
Artist Ranking 2024
- Gem2i 345
Description
Using the Green Velvet moniker to make his singularly twisted, funk-flecked house and techno hybrid, it was as Cajmere that he made his first musical mark back in the early 90′s after ditching school half way through a post-grad, chemical engineering degree at top-notch US college Berkeley.
Up until then music had been a hobby fueled by cobbling together tracks on a “sixty buck keyboard, a cheap four-track and a cheap drum machine” while still an undergraduate at the University of Illinois. This DIY method of production was never taken seriously and when childhood plans to become a doctor were shelved Jones was firmly committed to a career as a chemical engineer. Because his dad was an occasional DJ — and no-one wants to do what their dad did for a living, right? — a musical path was something he’d never considered as a teenager.
When he emerged as the flamboyant, neon-haired Green Velvet to front mid-90′s hits like ‘Preacher Man’, ‘Answering Machine’ and ‘Flash’ the shock-waves reverberated throughout house and techno scenes world over. This elaborately garbed, lyrically wild creature scored a direct hit, putting his hometown Chicago back on house music’s production map. “I’ve always been quite shy and introverted in a way,” says Jones. “So it was weird getting up on stage and doing the Velvet thing. It’s just quite strange that I’m doing what I’m doing now.”