JES, The Fan Club, Aug. 16, 10 p.m. Tickets $30 (19+) 604-689-7720.
When JES was a teenager she responded to a producer’s ad in the The Village Voice looking for a singer.
“It started with that one recording session and just kept going,” she says. “The producer gave me the recording and I listened to it and it was so overwhelming — a dream come true. After that I was really lucky to do some more. I was into learning anything I could. I did anything I could to get around musicians or be in a studio. I did a lot of networking and I went out at night all the time.”
Friday JES performs in Vancouver at The Fan Club. The New York City native says she is looking forward to performing in Vancouver for the first time in years.
“I do remember being there before but I think it was six years ago. I’ve wanted to play there for a long time. I’ve got a lot of fans there and I am excited to be heading back,” she says.
Earlier this month, JES released her latest album Unleash the Beat Volume 2to Black Hole Recordings. She says the album is more of a traditional mix album with a total of 28 tracks.
“You have to go back and forth with your record company and try to license a lot of tracks. This is the new thing for me because my first album was mostly mixes of my own music. But this is more of a traditional DJ mix,” she says.
The new set showcases more of her skills as a DJ.
“It is a little more high intensity,” JES says. “A lot of my original picks had to be changed because I couldn’t get the rights and what not.”
Her voice is featured on remixes and collaborations with a handful of notable artists including DJ Tiësto, Robbie Rivera, Andy Duguid, Christian Burns, BT and Paul Oakenfold.
“I do come from a musical, artistic family,” JES says. “Music was always a part of our life. My mom taught me songs and was always playing records. I was always obsessed with music. We had a piano and a lot of instruments around the house. I wanted to do music and I wrote songs and recorded them on tape recorders, anything I could The first song I ever wrote was about my pet.”
JES eventually decided to leave New York City for Southern California. It was while she was working in a studio in Los Angeles that she came across Mike Olson who introduced her to trance.
“I had left New York for a little trip to Los Angeles and I never went back. I sort of reinvented myself. It was like a new atmosphere for music. A lot more bands, a lot more guitar and a lot more live music,” she says. “He was really into trance music. I had never heard of trance music.
“It’s very melodic so it speaks to a singer because it is all about really bringing out the melody. It’s over 135 bpm so it’s a very fast tempo. I felt like it was easy for me,” she adds.
In 2002, JES formed Guardians of Earth with Olson. They produced the song ‘Star Child’ which was mixed by Paul van Dyke.
“I did a couple songs with him and we recorded them in the studio that we worked in,” she says.
After spending a year in Guardians of the Earth, JES decided to leave the group and started another band Motorcycle.
It didn’t take long for Motorcycle to gain popularity. Their song “As The Rush Comes” was the number one single on Billboard’s Hot Dance Airplay U.S. chart in 2004. It was also the fourth most-played dance song of the decade on Billboard’s 2000-2010 chart.
“We knew we had something special but we didn’t have any idea how much people would love the song,” JES says.
The track was eventually remixed by a handful of highly respected DJs including Armin van Buuren, Tiësto, Above & Beyond and Markus Schultz.
“It grew from the underground and I don’t even think things grow like that anymore, with the time that we live in now,” she says. “We all were really struggling and then that song kind of catapulted us into another realm.”
In 2006, JES decided it was time to embark on a solo career again. She released her first album, Disconnect, in 2007 and opened for Tiësto on his Elements of Life Tour. Her single “Imagination” charted at number six on Billboard’s Dance Airplay in 2009.
“It was wonderful. I got to live in Amsterdam for a year,” JES says. “It’s funny because I don’t really come from the dance world. Everything was such a learning experience for me. I was a little naive I think. I think it was good. I think it worked to my advantaged.”
She performed in over 20 countries including China, Japan, Taiwan, Thailand, Philippines, Indonesia, Australia, Malaysia, Macedonia, Latvia, Hungary, Norway, Belgium, Estonia, Russia, Portugal, Ireland, the United States and Canada.
“I learned a lot because playing to seas of people is a lot different than playing to clubs,” JES says. “It was an amazing experience.”
In 2008, JES released her second solo album, Into the Dawn — The Hits Disconnected. She followed that up with her album, High Glow, in 2010. A couple of JES’s other songs appear on Tiësto’s albums In Search of Sunrise 4, In Search of Sunrise 5, and In Search of Sunrise 6.
Also in 2008, JES lent her musical talents to the Netherlands-based charity dance4life. Her song “Lost In The Sound” was featured on their fundraiser album. The organization works with a series of other smaller regional based organizations to provide young people with proper sexual educational and raise awareness about HIV/AIDS.
“I was touring with Tiësto and we were in South Africa and he actually went in and visited a lot of kids in orphanages and kids who had AIDS in the hospitals,” JES says. “When they asked me to be participate I immediately wanted to be part of it. It is a great organization. I just felt that it was dear to my heart.”
When JES is not working on music she can often be found hosting her radio show Unleash the Beat heard worldwide on stations such as Chicago’s Addicted to Radio (addictedtoradio.com). Visit unleashthebeat.com for podcasts of the show and a list of stations.
“It’s an hour mix show,” she says. “It’s a continuous mix of music, that’s really the job of the DJs and that’s why some of the DJs these days are so popular — it’s because of the journey they take you on.”
For more information visit planetjes.com or follow @Official_JES.
