YOU’VE probably forgot all about a musical subgenre called new jack swing. It was a big deal back around the end of the 1980s, a mix of r’n’b-style vocals over hip-hop beats. Thanks to names such as Teddy Riley and Babyface, it shined brightly before making way for the clubbier sounds that dominated the 1990s.
Like everything these days, New Jack Swing is having a second wind. An Irish DJ is carving out a niche for himself and picking up the right sort of attention in the right sort of places. He is tipped for very big things indeed.
Declan Lennon, from Dublin’s Monkstown, works under the name Krystal Klear, doesn’t just head up the monthly Hoya Hoya night in Manchester (regularly voted best UK club night) but is making waves on the US dance circuit and is poised to tip over any month now.
As some indication of his appeal, he was the only Irish DJ selected to participate in this year’s Red Bull Music Academy, a series of advanced lectures, workshops and so on for tomorrow’s stars today that is currently running in Madrid.
Lennon, who took on the name Krystal Klear because of its 1980s retro feel, operates in the area between new jack swing and boogie house. With such a fresh take on club music, and a real sense of purpose about his sets, he makes for the most interesting name to emerge from the Irish dance scene in many years.
It all began for the now 23-year-old when he was hanging around Temple Bar Square with the other goths, skaters and metal heads – which is why the area is more informally known as “I Hate My Parents Square” – and getting into the likes of Metallica and Pearl Jam before realising that his impulse really lay with sourcing rare Earth, Wind and Fire records.
“I did play in a metal band for a while growing up, but I always had this thing about ’80s boogie music, which was a bit incompatible with everyone else around me,” he says. “My father used to listen to a lot of ’80s synth-pop, and acts such as Luther Vandross, so I did have an ear for that sound, but it was only when I got into hip-hop and found I preferred the original samples to the actual hip-hop track that I really pursued the idea of new jack swing and boogie music.”
In today’s fractured dance world, a signature sound is a prerequisite, and Lennon’s contemporary take on boogie makes him anything but a pale imitator of other people’s sounds.
The first time round, new jack swing helped bring a pop sheen to the then hip-hop explosion (it was a classic collision of old and new styles), and its re-emergence couldn’t be better timed, given that so-called urban and r’n’b music in general have such a grip on the charts.
Lennon relocated to Manchester a few years ago for the simple fact that most northern UK cities have big student populations and it’s there that you’ll find audiences who are receptive to new sounds and encouraging of anyone who goes against the grain but can still retain a core dance following.
Lennon begins his stint at the Red Bull Music Academy this weekend. "It's like being in dance music's version of The Apprentice– but you can't get fired," he says. It's a gruelling process to even apply for a place, and of the many thousands who show an interest, only a handful get picked.
“The great thing for me is that at the academy you might find yourself at a lecture by Parliament’s sound engineer or get to meet the guy who invented the 808 synth, and then you get to do your own shows at night time.”
Expect some Dublin dates from Krystal Klear before the year’s end. soundcloud.com/krystalklear
Mixed bag
** Stone Roses for Slane? Make it happen.
** The X Factor: put it out of its misery now.
