Biography
In 1997 the Jimpster alias of ambient and jazz jungle producer Jamie Odell ranked among the most anticipated acts, drawing endorsements from Mixmaster Morris and Coldcut alike. As the style’s experimental wing shifted toward techstep and the descriptors “ambient” and “jazz” turned into dismissive labels on the dancefloor, Odell’s music drifted away from club energy toward home listening, attracting electronica followers in much the same way Squarepusher and Amon Tobin’s Cujo project had done. A series of EPs issued on his own Freerange imprint appealed to listeners who rejected techstep’s dense, abrasive textures yet sought greater sophistication than the standard rolling house breaks and atmospheric pads found in most dancefloor-oriented ambient jungle. His first album-length statement, Martian Arts, compiled those Freerange tracks and appeared on New York’s Instinct label in the middle of 1997.
Odell channels his jazz influences through unexpected routes, much like Squarepusher and Cujo, frequently evoking the fusion era of Weather Report, Herbie Hancock, and the Bitches Brew period of Miles Davis while avoiding heavy reliance on samples. Instead he works from live session recordings made in his own studio. At the time he began releasing music, Odell was studying both jazz and contemporary composition; music ran in the family, with his mother performing as a jazz vocalist on London stages and his father drumming in the jazz-funk fusion group Shakatak. The first proper Jimpster long-player, Messages from the Hub, arrived on Kudos in 1999, followed a year later by the wide-ranging compilation Scrambled.
Domestic Science, Jimpster’s second studio album, surfaced in 2002 and moved fluidly between 1980s-tinged jazz-funk and hypnotic deep house. That same year Odell co-founded the improvising jazz-electronic collective the Bays, a band committed to the principle “Performance Is the Product” and therefore unwilling to rehearse or issue commercial recordings. He resumed the Jimpster name in 2006 with the meticulously produced third album Amour, which explored house textures more fully. Attention to label operations and DJ work reduced his release rate to occasional singles until the 2013 arrival of the fourth album Porchlight & Rockingchairs. Retaining the familiar blend of smooth, jazz-tinged deep house, the record balanced club-oriented cuts with relaxed, home-listening material. After several remix EPs, Jimpster issued the English Rose EP on Freerange in 2015 and, the following year, collaborated with Japanese producer Kuniyuki on the Kalima’s Dance EP. By 2017, two decades after founding the label and with remix credits in the triple digits, Odell delivered his fifth album, Silent Stars.
Odell channels his jazz influences through unexpected routes, much like Squarepusher and Cujo, frequently evoking the fusion era of Weather Report, Herbie Hancock, and the Bitches Brew period of Miles Davis while avoiding heavy reliance on samples. Instead he works from live session recordings made in his own studio. At the time he began releasing music, Odell was studying both jazz and contemporary composition; music ran in the family, with his mother performing as a jazz vocalist on London stages and his father drumming in the jazz-funk fusion group Shakatak. The first proper Jimpster long-player, Messages from the Hub, arrived on Kudos in 1999, followed a year later by the wide-ranging compilation Scrambled.
Domestic Science, Jimpster’s second studio album, surfaced in 2002 and moved fluidly between 1980s-tinged jazz-funk and hypnotic deep house. That same year Odell co-founded the improvising jazz-electronic collective the Bays, a band committed to the principle “Performance Is the Product” and therefore unwilling to rehearse or issue commercial recordings. He resumed the Jimpster name in 2006 with the meticulously produced third album Amour, which explored house textures more fully. Attention to label operations and DJ work reduced his release rate to occasional singles until the 2013 arrival of the fourth album Porchlight & Rockingchairs. Retaining the familiar blend of smooth, jazz-tinged deep house, the record balanced club-oriented cuts with relaxed, home-listening material. After several remix EPs, Jimpster issued the English Rose EP on Freerange in 2015 and, the following year, collaborated with Japanese producer Kuniyuki on the Kalima’s Dance EP. By 2017, two decades after founding the label and with remix credits in the triple digits, Odell delivered his fifth album, Silent Stars.
Albums
Singles
