Erol Alkan

Erol Alkan
Erol Alkan Live
Background information
Birth name	Erol Alkan
Also known as	Kurtis Rush Mustapha 3000 Beyond The Wizards Sleeve
Born	(1974-05-30) 30 May 1974 London, England
Genres	Electro house[1]
Occupation(s)	DJ, producer, musician
Instruments	Turntables, guitar, bass, drums, voice, CDJ-2000
Years active	1994–present
Labels	Phantasy
Associated acts	Boys Noize
Website	erolalkan.co.uk

Erol Alkan (born 30 May 1974)^[2] is a London-based electro DJ of Turkish Cypriot descent.^[3]

Career

DJ and club promoter

In 1993, Erol Alkan started DJing in various indie nightclubs in London.

In 1995, he was a resident DJ of club night 'Going Underground' co-founded by Glyn Peppiatt and James Dickie. It was held weekly on Mondays at the Plastic People venue which was situated at its original Oxford Street location in Central London.

In 1997, Erol re-launched the club under a new name: Trash. Over the next years, Trash became one of the most influential clubs of its time.^[4] Until its closure in 2007, Trash saw performances by Peaches, LCD Soundsystem, Klaxons, Bloc Party, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Electric Six and many more up and coming bands.

From 2001 onwards, Erol Alkan started to play regular DJ sets outside Trash, focusing on dance music, influenced by his sets at Bugged Out. Bugged Out are credited as launching Erol's dance music career after offering him a residency halfway through his debut set for them at Fabric, when Erol filled in for David Holmes who had missed a flight into London. His profile increased considerably during 2003 when he was voted 'Best Breakthrough DJ' by Muzik magazine, and in 2006, when he earned the Mixmag 2006 "DJ of the Year" award. Erol has also been voted Datatransmissions 'DJ Of The Year' in both 2008 and 2009, which is seen as an alternative to the DJ Mag Top 100 awards but consists only of British DJs.

Since 2008, Alkan has also hosted a regular radio show, as the longest running resident of BBC 6Music's 6Mix until 2015, and from 2014, has programmed a Boiler Room residency.

He has released multiple successful DJ mixes, including two editions of 'A Bugged Out/Bugged In' mix, a 2012 mix for Belgian festival I Love Techno and a 2014 contribution to the prestigious Fabriclive series that was awarded 'Mix Of The Year' by DJ Mag.

Remixer

Erol Alkan released a series of mash-ups using the alias Kurtis Rush' in the early 2000s, including a mix of Kylie Minogue's "Can't Get You Out Of My Head" and New Order's "Blue Monday", which was performed by Minogue at the Brit Awards. Erol also used the alias Mustapha 3000, and is half of the psychedelic dance-rock act Beyond the Wizard's Sleeve, along with Richard Norris. In 2016, Beyond The Wizard's Sleeve' released a long-anticipated debut album, The Soft Bounce, featuring collaborations with artists such as Hannah Peel, Jane Weaver, Euros Childs and Jon Savage. In 2016, London record store Rough Trade featured The Soft Bounce as one of their top ten records of 2016 in their annual end of year list.

Erol Alkan has remixed tracks from artists including Klaxons, Alter Ego, Bloc Party, Daft Punk, The Chemical Brothers, Gonzales, Tame Impala, MGMT, Connan Mockasin, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, ZZT, Fan Death, Digitalism, Scissor Sisters, Justice, Franz Ferdinand, LA Priest, Interpol, Hot Chip, Death From Above 1979, Alter Ego, Metronomy, Mylo, Tame Impala, Night Works, Margot, Todd Rundgren, Kindness, Connan Mockasin and New Order.

Producer

Erol Alkan has also taken a hand to producing, working on 3 albums within a 2-year period. His first production credit is the entire Mystery Jets' second album, Twenty One, which contained the 2 top 40 hit singles "Young Love" and "Two Doors Down", Late of the Pier's debut record, Fantasy Black Channel, and The Long Blondes' second album Couples

In 2007 Alkan founded his own label, named Phantasy, which has released music from Daniel Avery, Connan Mockasin, Ghost Culture, Cowboy Rhythmbox, Kamera, U and Alkan's own Beyond The Wizard's Sleeve Project, as well as his first EP of solo club tracks, 'Illumination' in 2013.

Discography

Original releases

Mix and compilation albums

Remixes as Erol Alkan

Remixes as Beyond the Wizards Sleeve

Album production

Other work

Erol Alkan has produced remixes for Headman, Ali Love and Voodoo Chilli under his Mustapha 3000 alias.

He is also one half of psychedelic rock group Beyond the Wizard's Sleeve.^[6] BTWS have remixed tracks (often listed as "Re-Animations") for Peter Bjorn and John, Midlake, Simian Mobile Disco, Franz Ferdinand, Badly Drawn Boy, The Chemical Brothers, Goldfrapp, Late of the Pier, Tracey Thorn, Dust Galaxy, The Real Ones, and Findlay Brown. They've also released an album called "Ark 1" in 2008, and four EPs - "Birth", "Spring", "George" & "West".

Erol compiled a 2xCD mix for the Bugged Out series. The second disc, "A Bugged In Selection with Erol Alkan", is a collection of downtempo tracks. Erol has also released mix compilations for Muzik Magazine and Mixmag.

He also produced the Klaxons song "Electrickery", which was the b-side to the 2007 re-release of Gravity's Rainbow, & "The Night", which was the b-side to "Not Over Yet" single.

After signing to Rough Trade Records, Erol produced all of The Long Blondes' b-sides including their second album "Couples".

Other productions: Whitey's "Do The Nothing", Franz Ferdinand's "All my Friends (LCD Soundsystem Cover)"

Erol was working on remixes for Björk and Interpol in summer 2007, but lost them due to a hard drive failure.^[7]

Erol produced the Mystery Jets' second album entitled 'Twenty One' which was released on 24 March 2008 from which the first single, "Flakes" debuted online.^[8]

He has also produced Late of the Pier's debut album "Fantasy Black Channel", which was released 11 August 2008 on Parlophone Records. Despite not being nominated for the Mercury Music Prize (as widely expected) it was awarded an alternative Album Of The Year accolade by Drowned In Sound, in which the public voted.

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Erol Alkan.

• Erol Alkan on Spotify
• Erol Alkan's Soundcloud Profile
• Erol Alkan's Facebook Page
• Erol Alkan's Twitter Profile
• Erol Alkan on Resident Advisor

Audio links

• Erol Alkan on Mixcloud
• Erol Alkan DJ mix from Trash