Nickodemus

Operating out of New York City, DJ and producer Nickodemus first gained notice as the resident selector for the long-running weekly Turntables on the Hudson parties while steadily issuing his own recordings, most prominently the 2006 full-length Endangered Species. His approach draws on a broad spectrum of groove-oriented sounds, moving freely among house, Latin, Afro-beat, and reggae. Early exposure came through his household, where Motown, disco, and Latin records were constantly in rotation. By the late ’80s he had developed a strong interest in hip-hop, regularly listening to DJ Red Alert’s radio program. He began performing as a DJ in 1990, citing Kid Capri and David Morales among his key inspirations, and in 1998 he teamed with fellow selector Mariano to launch Turntables on the Hudson at Chelsea Piers on Manhattan’s west side beside the Hudson River. The event ran successfully for more than ten years and yielded three mix albums on Rhythm Love Records—Nickodemus & Mariano Present Turntables on the Hudson, Vol. 1 (1999), Vol. 2 (2000), and Vol. 3 (2002)—plus a fourth volume on Giant Step Records in 2003.

During the same period Nickodemus began releasing his own productions, occasionally working alongside Osiris or Jay B. Early singles appeared on Codek Records with Tribute to Baba (1997), Listen to Your World (1998), Universal Greetings (1998), and Dippin South (1998), followed by further outings on Mush Records (A New Day, 1998; Earth, 1999) and Rhythm Love Records (The Rhythm Love EP, 1999; Desert Dancer, 2001). Additional tracks surfaced on Giant Step Records (Free Souls, 2001; Mariposa, 2002) before he settled primarily with Wonderwheel Records, issuing Cleopatra in New York Remix EP (2003), Funky in the Middle (2005), Give the Drummer Some (2005), and subsequent material. His debut artist album, Endangered Species, arrived in 2006 on Thievery Corporation’s ESL Music imprint, with the companion remix collection Endangered Species Remixed appearing the next year.

Sun People landed in 2009 and included two productions by Quantic, quickly followed by another set of remixes. Three years later he delivered the wide-ranging Moon People, featuring contributions from Afrika Bambaataa through Kissey Asplund. He maintained a steady schedule of DJ mix releases, among them the second volume of Poets Club’s Poets Dub series (2013) and the Wonderwheel retrospective Wonderworld. Turntables on the Caribbean and the collaborative EP The Crow with Alsarah both surfaced in 2016. In 2017 Nickodemus issued a cover of the Mary Jane Girls’ “In My House” that featured vocalists Lisa Shaw and Carol C plus a guest rap from Baby Bam of the Jungle Brothers; the single also contained “Funk That,” a contemporary revision of Sagat’s ’90s hip-house track.