In 1984, Liebrand also began creating shorter ‘minimixes’ that contained no more than four tracks and acted as a platform for his own edits/remixes. ‘Grandmix’ would run on Radio Veronica until 1992, becoming a Dutch institution that informed a whole generation of DJs.
#Newcleus jam on it dancers in 2018 series
The ‘ Grandmix’ series was launched at the end of ’83, consisting of 100 of the year’s most popular club tracks. Many of these tracks turned up in Liebrand’s mixes. New York disco culture was embraced by the Dutch, with the Rams Horn label licencing numerous tracks from NYC companies between 1979-85, including Prelude, Salsoul and “O” Records, as well as Canadian disco imprint Matra.
It was the first non-stop mix show broadcast nationwide. Liebrand embarked on his longest residency in December 1980, an 8-year association with newly-opened Nijmegen gay venue The Keizer Karel, but it was on the radio that he really made his mark, starting the weekly hour-long ‘In The Mix’, for Radio Veronica. In 1978 he started out as resident at local club Juicy Lucy, before moving to The Kwien in ‘79, where he witnessed fellow-DJ Huib Luiten mix records together, setting his career course - Luiten himself having seen DJs mixing whilst in the US the previous year. He introduced a plethora of new electronic music and the concept of non-stop mixing to the Dutch airwaves.īorn in Nijmegen, the Netherlands, in 1960, Liebrand was playing parties with his mobile disco aged 16. We've drafted in Greg Wilson, the former electro-funk pioneer, nowadays a leading figure in the global disco/re-edits movement and respected commentator on dance music and popular culture, to bring us four random nuggets of history highlighting a classic DJ, label, venue and record each month.īen Liebrand is viewed as the Godfather of Dutch dance culture, cited by Armin van Buuren, Ferry Corsten, Olav Basoski and Tiësto, as a formative influence.