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Why look for
a partnership on the other side of the world when two perfectly
complementary personalities are living under the same roof?
Mandrax
and Seb K asked themselves this question and the answer
was not long in coming: they decided to pool their respective
assets and form SHAKEDOWN together!These two
wizards of sound have known each other for a long time? Mainly
because they are brothers! Growing up together in the seventies
in Lausanne, music quickly became their great obsession.
Seb K listened to James Brown and Grandmaster Flash, while his
big brother was a fan of The Clash and Mantronix.In 1986, Mandrax
decided to go to England and to put it into his own word,"after
a New Order concert, I caught a set by Mike Pickering, the Hacienda
DJ. It was a complete revelation. When I got back to Switzerland,
I got seriously into house."Soon, Mandrax
gained international recognition as a DJ and toured
Europe non-stop. In 1992, he decided to travel to New York
for a change of air and devote himself completely to electronic
music. There, he co-founded the house label Liquid
Groove then Boombastic with cult producer Mike Delgado.
Seb K headed
for England. He worked in a studio in 1993 and got into production. "When I came back to Lausanne in 1996, I founded the
Bel Air Project with Alex Attias. It was a jazzy project,
experimental and a bit crazy!" He quickly gained a name
among his peers as a talented writer and producer. His Bel Air
Project even drew compliments from Gilles Peterson, the great
guru of the Talkin' Loud label!A few nights,
labels and maxis later, the brothers became
a reference on the electronic scene. Now
they had to put the finishing touches to this reputation with
a real album and it was as SHAKEDOWN that the two
artists united their gifts: musical expertise, a talent for manipulating
sound, an innate sense of rhythm and melodious charisma were put
through the magic shaker? The result is an album of stimulating,
inspired electronic groove where house becomes unpredictable ("Wonder
Why"), soul catches fire ("At Night"),
electro engulfs ("You Think you Know") and funk
is shaken up ("Get Down"). 'The sound is unstoppable:
SHAKEDOWN have found the right mix to reconcile listener-friendliness
with futurism'. (Benoit Sabatier)PS: He is
a living legend. He has worked with James Brown, Keith Richards,
George Clinton and Herbie Hancock? His name is Bootsy Collins.
He was looking for producers and found SHAKEDOWN who co-wrote
and produced one of the tracks on his album !
The single
'At Night' was mixed by Mousse T, Alan Braxe & Kid
Creme. Having achieved #6 in the UK singles chart,
the buzz and hype on this single around Europe was and still is
amazing.
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