Night Flight
New Member
- Joined
- May 26, 2008
- Messages
- 19
Francois K (Deep Space, New York)
Button Factory | Friday 25 July | Doors 11pm | €20 on the door / €15 Advance.
Born and raised in France, Francois Kevorkian moved to the US 1975, where he hoped to find more challenging situations than those back home. Due to the heavy competition for any gig as a drummer in those days, he instead tried his hand at becoming a DJ in underground New York City clubs. He taught himself tape editing and started making disco medleys, some of which are still popular to this day, such as Rare Earth's "Happy Song". He was offered a position doing A&R for a nascent dance indie record label, Prelude Records.
During that time, he was privileged enough to play as a guest DJ at such legendary venues as the Paradise Garage, The Loft, Better Days, Studio 54, Les Mouches, Buttermilk Bottom, and AM-PM, as well as a residency at New Jersey's Club Zanzibar on Fridays for over a year. The great success of his remixes led him to record producing, and his first work was the Snake Charmer EP for Island Records, utilizing an all-star cast of Jah Wobble, The Edge, Holger Czukay, and Jaki Liebezeit. His career as a remixer and producer led him to work or collaborate with many more mainstream artists, such as Eurythmics, Diana Ross, U2, Kraftwerk, Mick Jagger, Ashford & Simpson, The Cure, Midnight Oil, Jimmy Cliff, Foreigner, Jean Michel Jarre, Jan Hammer, The Fatback Band, Bunny Wailer, The Smiths, Pet Shop Boys, Cabaret Voltaire, and culminated in his involvement in mixing all of Kraftwerk's 1986 studio album, Electric Café. He mixed Depeche Mode biggest-selling album, Violator.
During this time he decided to build his own recording studio which shared the same building as Studio 54. Due to the pressures of studio work, he had abandoned DJing around 1983 to dedicate himself to recording and mixing full-time, but couldn't stay away from the turntables, and started spinning again in early 1990. The scene had really become much more international. He toured Japan, DJ'ing with Larry Levan in the Summer of 1992 (the 'Harmony Tour') right before Levan's death in November of that same year.
By 1995, he decided to start an eclectic independent record label, Wave Music. Then in 1996, he (along with partner John Davis) became involved in starting what arguably became one of New York's most revered weekly parties, Body&SOUL which took place every Sunday afternoon at Club Vinyl (6 Hubert Street), playing along with co-resident DJs Joaquin 'Joe' Claussell and Danny Krivit for a mixed crowd of ecstatic and faithful dancers from all over the world. The 'Body&SOUL' sound, a unique soulful mix of very organic and spiritual dance music grooves, led to the release of a successful compilation series by the same name.
From April 2003 to the present he has been running a residency at a weekly Monday night event in New York City called Deep Space NYC, which focuses on Dub in all of its forms, and where the format is extremely eclectic, ranging from spaced-out Techno to the deepest Reggae, Dubstep, Hip-Hop as well as Drum & Bass, House music and Disco. His recent musical output has him mixing Deep Space NYC Vol. 1, a compilation featuring several of his own original productions (along with Jamaican dub legends Mutabaruka and U-Roy); he also recently did notable remixes for Moloko, Yoko Ono, Cesaria Evora, Nina Simone, as well as much for his own label. In 2005, he was inducted into the Dance Music Hall of Fame as both a remixer and DJ.
We've had some special nights at the Nightflight already but this easily has the potential to be the best.
Advance tickets available now from tickets ie & at City Discs from early next week.
▲ NIGHTFLIGHT in August
Friday 1st August: Rarely Seen Above Ground, Alphamono + more
Friday 8th August: Joakim DJ Set
Friday 15th August: Nightflight Residents
Friday 22nd August: Eoin Cregan, Matagouri, Dave Salacious
Friday 22nd August: Nightflight Residents
