Vrijdag 17 september is het dan zover: Berlin Underground en Steam slaan de handen ineen voor wat beloofd een smerig avondje, muzikale verwennerij te worden.
Van oudsher staat Bacardi bekend om haar sfeervolle feesten op haar landgoed in Cuba. Maar sinds kort is het merk ook actief in de Nederlandse muziekwereld.
Vanaf september verwend Panama de bezoekers weer eens met een “Panama presents” avond. Deze avonden staan altijd garant voor de grootste internationale & nationale DJ’s.
John Benitez was born in South Bronx, New York city, back in 1959. The family lived in an apartment on Burnside Avenue in the Bronx, and his sister Debbie was the one who gave him his nickname - Jellybean.
Already as a child he used to entertain his family and friends by playing them different records on the turntable. This was the time when songs like 'Don't leave me this way' by Thelma Houston was among the hottest songs in the charts. It was back then he first started to collect records and he soon learned, during his home sessions, that he could get the 'audience' in different moods depending on what song he played...
He always thought of a DJ as a guy playing records on the radio, but when he entered the Sanctuary nightclub in Manhattan in the late seventies his life changed forever... When he heard the DJ mixing two songs together he definatly know he wanted to become a professional Discoteque DJ!
Studio 54 logo Jellybean started his DJ career in 1975 in a club in the Bronx, called Charlie's. But he really wanted to go further... he wanted to work in the famous Manhattan clubs. He got a gig at a club called Experiment 4 and by getting the right contacts he came to play at the trendy Xenon. This was really a break-through for his career...
During 1978 to 1981 all the hottest clubs, like Electric Circus and the legendary Studio 54, all wanted to hire Jellybean to play in their club. From april 1981 'til june 1984 he was the resident DJ of the Manhattan club Fun House. It was during his sessions at this club the well known phrase "Jellybean Rocks the House" was founded!
The crowd at the Fun House were very musically aware and Jellybean got total freedom to explore dance music and examine the break beats, instrumental fills and all the other components of the 12-inch extended mixes. His style was so popular that he were asked to host a weekend dance show in America's No.1 radio station - WKTU.
Many new upcoming bands and artists got a break thanks to John playing their songs at the Clubs and/or in his radio show. Already back in 1980 he's included in the Special Thanks section of the Invisible Man's Bands self-titled album, which include the awesome Disco song "All night thing".
John had achieved his DJ goals and he now wanted to go on to remixing singles. His first remix was 'the Bubble Bunch' by Jimmy Spicer, later followed by the classics 'Walking on Sunshine' by Rockers Revenge and Africa Bambaataa's 'Planet Rock'.
All he actually was allowed to do in the remixes back then, was to take the existing track and make a good intro to it and a nice break. Although he wasn't allowed to do any overdubs or tonal changes, his remixes became very popular, specially since he played them in his radio show. Many of the remixes he played wasn't available in the stores, and for example Jellybean's remix of 'Flashdance' by Irene Cara was very sought for. This helped to get the record companies aware of the audience's demand of commercial available 12-inch single remixes.
In a cermony in September 19, 2005 in New York, Jellybean got full recognition for his successful DJ career when he, along with DJ collegues Francois Kevorkian and Frankie Knuckles, were voted into the Dance Music Hall of Fame!
