Mohan

Seattle native Dave "Elmo" Nugent, who also records under the name Mohan, maintains multiple roles across jazz and electronic music. In Pacific Northwest venues he performs and records straight-ahead jazz as a hard-swinging saxophonist equally fluent on tenor, alto, and soprano. Under the Mohan moniker he shifts to electronica’s gentler, melody-driven wing, favoring chillout, downtempo, and ambient textures that remain rhythmically grounded while often turning lush or ethereal.

His vocal Mohan tracks draw from late-’80s and early-’90s smooth R&B, echoing Sade, Soul II Soul’s “Keep on Moving,” and N’Dea Davenport’s work with the Brand New Heavies on “Stay This Way” and “Never Stop.” Female singers such as Havilah and Tanya Asmundson appear on these pieces, which additionally reflect the atmospheric pop sensibility of Julee Cruise.

After concentrating on jazz saxophone in Seattle during the 1980s, Nugent began exploring electronica in the early 1990s yet continued leading the jazz ensemble Dave Nugent’s Gates of Tolerance. In 2004 that group issued the album Gates of Tolerance on the independent Bellingham, Washington label Jazz Project. The same year he started tracking his Mohan project As Is Where Is, completing it in early 2005; roughly six months later the sixty-minute album appeared in the United States on Sound Visual/Delvian.

On As Is Where Is, Nugent functions primarily as composer, producer, and arranger, concentrating on keyboards and electronic programming, sampling, and related studio craft while contributing minimal saxophone. The resulting recordings have drawn comparisons to 2000s work by Olive, Delerium, Honeyroot, Jakatta, Chris Coco, and Thievery Corporation.