James Lavelle

James Lavelle

Lavelle hung out with fellow-travellers all over the world: Nigo and MoWax signings Major Force in Tokyo, Massive Attack in the UK, and the Beastie Boys in New York to name a few. He also hooked up with pretty much every artist of any merit from the 1990s; from Radiohead, Oasis and the Verve to Beastie Boys and Carl Craig
let's not forget that James helped to set-up clubs such as Blue Note, Fabric, Bar Rumba and The Scala (and was the first to ever do nights there), as well as The Gardening Club and Fridge (the latter being a place where at the age of 16, James became the youngest DJ to have a residency in London).
LAVELLE´S act UNKLE began as a loose MoWax ´supergroup´, originally started by James, Tim Goldsworthy (DFA Records) and Kudo (Major Force fame). Having released a number of singles, Tim moved to New York and Kudo to Japan after which James proceeded to record artist and friend DJ Shadow, of which his 1998 album ´Psceynce Fiction´ recruited guests like Thom Yorke, Mike D, Badly Drawn Boy and Richard Ashcroft to an album of beat-heavy experimental beauty.
Trimmed down to a duo of Lavelle and singer/producer Richard File, UNKLE collaborated with director Jonathan Glazer on the soundtrack to his stylish gangster movie Sexy Beast. In 2002 they released ´Never, Never Land´, an album which brought an electronic dimension to the sound. Ian Brown sang ´Reign´. ´In A Stat´', with remixes from DJ legend Sasha. There were contributions from Jarvis Cocker, Queens Of The Stone Age frontman Josh Homme, and Massive Attack´s 3D