On Saturday, June 8, the well-known British producer and musician James Lavelle, aka 'UNKLE', will visit the "Hanza Perons" cultural space in Riga with an audiovisual performance.
For at least thirty years now, James Lavelle has been among the world's leading producers of electronic and club music. It is not for nothing that many people trust his taste and allow him to create their own, and invite him to curate events, recordings and other projects.
Lavelle started DJing in Oxford when he was just fifteen, but soon became a regular at club nights. After moving to London, the young musician founded a record label, which he called the same as his first party series - 'Mo'Wax Please'. Having met Gilles Peterson (Gilles Peterson), together they soon established what later became legendary Monday nights in the bar 'Rumba', and it had happened - James Lavelle was in the vanguard of electronic music in London and all of Great Britain. To stay.
Perhaps local historians will object, but the official biography of the musician says that James Lavelle is one of the first DJs who began to perform so widely and regularly in Eastern Europe and China, while developing the so-called 'UNKLESounds' project and expanding the tour geography to Tokyo in the east and Mexico City in the westbound from London.
It is a common thing for electronic music producers to invite instrumentalists, singers, and arrangers from various genres to help realize their studio ideas. But there won't be too many whose calls Thom Yorke, Richard Ashcroft, Brian Eno and Josh Homme will respond to with equal pleasure. Indeed, artists with such a circle of friends, ambitions and also the ability to realize their ideas tend to fall at the mercy of listeners and critics. Often only because they are capable of such a thing or 'because they can'. Sometimes also because, in its quest for the maximum, the creative attention turns into small change and careful, long-term fans notice it in an instant and do not forgive for a long time. But that's not why James Lavelle will give up curating festivals like 'Meltdown', having once invited David Bowie, Yoko Ono, Nick Cave, John Peele and others to perform. That's not why the nagging desire to go even further beyond the supposedly already known borders of the fusion of different art genres, creating the exhibition "Dreaming awake with Stanley Kubrick" in 2018 together with Anish Kapoor, Sarah Lucas, Thomas Bangalter and others or a year later an immersive exhibition at the London gallery 'Saatchi', which as a "walkable music album" toured Asia with huge success in the heat of the pandemic. And that's not why 'UNKLE' will not return to Latvia with the audiovisual performance 'Rōnin:Live' to honor the fifth anniversary of "Hanzas Perons" on June 8!
"It's about ideas. If you're Steven Spielberg, it may happen that thousands of people work to fulfill your vision, but it's still your vision," James Lavelle answered in an interview to the "Financial Times" magazine to those who expressed resignation against cooperation with him.
It has already been mentioned that this year in August it will be five years since "Hanzas Perons" opened its doors after the ambitious reconstruction in the summer of 2019. To mark this rather short measured road, and, on the other hand, looking into the distance, where "the railway tracks stretch from Perons", several bright cultural and artistic events are expected until the end of August.
Tickets for the UNKLE show on June 8 at "Hanzas Perons" can be purchased in the "Biļešu Paradīze" sales network. Tickets are currently on sale for 45 EUR. Ticket prices will increase as the event approaches.