Biography
Emerging from Manchester, Dylan Nathan formed part of a cohort of electronic producers shaped by U.K. acts such as Orbital and Aphex Twin, yet remained largely detached from the acid house scene that first nurtured those figures. Issuing material as Jega across several key imprints, his meticulously assembled fusions of new wave, electro, ambient, and drum'n'bass earned broad acclaim within the global experimental electronic underground, with his Skam output ranking among the Manchester label’s strongest releases, tied as it is to Autechre’s circle.
Nathan began after his close friend Mike Paradinas—known as µ-Ziq and founder of Planet Mu—encouraged him to acquire basic equipment and start composing. Those initial efforts surfaced on Skam in 1996 via the Phlax EP, followed in mid-1997 by the 12" Card Hore, which introduced drum'n'bass rhythms alongside frantically sliced samples. He also appeared on the Skam/Musik Aus Strom MASK 12" series and supplied a remix for MAS co-owner Michael Fakesch’s Demon 2 EP. After the 1997 Mealtime compilation featured a Jega track, his Type Xer0 EP and debut album Spectrum became Planet Mu’s first official releases in 1998; Paradinas has noted that Nathan helped spark the label’s creation. The playful, wide-ranging Spectrum drew strong responses from electronic listeners and received a U.S. release on Matador, prompting extensive American tours. Nathan also played shows in Iceland alongside Björk and toured Japan with Luke Vibert and Paradinas. He closed the decade with split singles shared with Capitol K, Kid Spatula (another Paradinas alias), and 808 State.
Geometry arrived in 2000 as a darker record that favored intricate architectural sound design over samples, coinciding with Nathan’s growing work in 3-D animation and design. Thom Yorke cited it as an influence on Radiohead’s Kid A, while the track “Inertia” was said to have shaped the soundtrack for the 2002 film Solaris. Nathan settled in Brooklyn in 2002, where he performed with local electronic artists including Datach'i and Team Shadetek while deepening his design focus. An early version of his third album, Variance, leaked online in 2003, prompting him to postpone and revise the project. He relocated to Los Angeles in 2005, launched an animation and visual design company, and began directing animated films, releasing occasional compilation tracks and playing sporadic shows with artists such as Plaid, Boxcutter, and Mochipet.
Variance finally appeared on Planet Mu in 2009 as a double album split into lighter and darker volumes that encompassed the full range of his style. Nathan provided graphic design for the 2010 feature film Tron: Legacy and completed the short film EXTROPY - Speedhack in 2015. That same year he contributed the unreleased 1997 archival track “103” to the limited three-CD edition of Planet Mu’s twentieth-anniversary compilation µ20. In 2016 Skam issued 1995, a collection of some of Jega’s earliest cassette recordings.
Nathan began after his close friend Mike Paradinas—known as µ-Ziq and founder of Planet Mu—encouraged him to acquire basic equipment and start composing. Those initial efforts surfaced on Skam in 1996 via the Phlax EP, followed in mid-1997 by the 12" Card Hore, which introduced drum'n'bass rhythms alongside frantically sliced samples. He also appeared on the Skam/Musik Aus Strom MASK 12" series and supplied a remix for MAS co-owner Michael Fakesch’s Demon 2 EP. After the 1997 Mealtime compilation featured a Jega track, his Type Xer0 EP and debut album Spectrum became Planet Mu’s first official releases in 1998; Paradinas has noted that Nathan helped spark the label’s creation. The playful, wide-ranging Spectrum drew strong responses from electronic listeners and received a U.S. release on Matador, prompting extensive American tours. Nathan also played shows in Iceland alongside Björk and toured Japan with Luke Vibert and Paradinas. He closed the decade with split singles shared with Capitol K, Kid Spatula (another Paradinas alias), and 808 State.
Geometry arrived in 2000 as a darker record that favored intricate architectural sound design over samples, coinciding with Nathan’s growing work in 3-D animation and design. Thom Yorke cited it as an influence on Radiohead’s Kid A, while the track “Inertia” was said to have shaped the soundtrack for the 2002 film Solaris. Nathan settled in Brooklyn in 2002, where he performed with local electronic artists including Datach'i and Team Shadetek while deepening his design focus. An early version of his third album, Variance, leaked online in 2003, prompting him to postpone and revise the project. He relocated to Los Angeles in 2005, launched an animation and visual design company, and began directing animated films, releasing occasional compilation tracks and playing sporadic shows with artists such as Plaid, Boxcutter, and Mochipet.
Variance finally appeared on Planet Mu in 2009 as a double album split into lighter and darker volumes that encompassed the full range of his style. Nathan provided graphic design for the 2010 feature film Tron: Legacy and completed the short film EXTROPY - Speedhack in 2015. That same year he contributed the unreleased 1997 archival track “103” to the limited three-CD edition of Planet Mu’s twentieth-anniversary compilation µ20. In 2016 Skam issued 1995, a collection of some of Jega’s earliest cassette recordings.
Albums
Singles
