KOLOMO
with an immense discography under his belt, we thought it was high time we caught up with Olivier Grégoire aka Kolombo
by liz cirelli
I have been a fan of Olivier Grégoire aka Kolombo for quite some time now. He has a huge number of releases on many highly influential labels and has a distinctly unique style of production – a style that I have found myself drawn to over and over again. He released his album Boulevard Cartier back in September 2008 on Vice Versa and I thought it was high time we took a look at what this man has achieved in a remarkably short space of time…
Hailing from the city of Namur in Southern Belgium, Olivier has been DJing and promoting very successful parties for a number of years. He began producing dance music in 2001 and by 2003 (or thereabouts) he had become a master at his art of modern production, creating many pseudonyms and forging new dance music genres.
His profile as an international artist began to grow when he started releasing on King Kong records (Sharam Jey's label). Together with his partner DJ Jerom, he has produced many electro-house EPs under the name of Loulou Players. The pair have since remixed artists such as Darren Emerson, Joachim Garraud, Kid Dub, John Acquaviva and Remo feat Cheleonis R Jones. They have become a hugely influential DJ duo in the Southern Belgium, playing huge raves and festivals.
Carried by this success, Olivier founded his own label, aptly named Loulou records. He also felt it was time to start producing alone and it was here that he began recording under his soon-to-be-big Kolombo moniker.
He began to experiment with new ideas and production techniques and found himself creating music that was a mixture of house, tech house and minimal – always with an club feel. Releases soon followed on labels such as Blu-Fin, Kitt Ball, Giant Wheel (with Moonbootique's Ante Perry), Boxer, Hypnotic, Robotronic, Definitive, Add2basket & Karate Klub.
He was also spotted by Systematic records boss, Marc Romboy, who created a sub-division of his label – Vice Versa – specifically to release Kolombo material. He then began remixing Systematic artists under his real name, Olivier Grégoire and a full solo EP on Systematic soon followed.
He then hooked up with Belgian producer Compuphonic to release EPs on Tiga's Turbo imprint, for which he also has solo material lined-up. They have also remixed Cari Lekebush and the Presets (on Modular).
As if this wasn’t enough Olivier also has a side project, Mugwump, which he set up with Belgian house DJ veteran Geoffroy (Hi-Phen, Suicide, SSR). This project is targeted at producing deeper music and so far recent releases have been on Mood Music, Misericord (Ewan Pearson's label), Disco45 (Rob Mello's label) and Kompakt – all of which have been causing a stir, with imminent Mugwump remixes and tracks due out soon on Kompakt & Eskimo.
The future looks bright for this shining talent, with new material lined-up on Turbo, Boxer, Hypnotic and many more, as well as collaborations and remixes all over with Compuphonic, Ante Perry and Mugwump.
Kolombo on Myspace: http://www.myspace.com/kolomboloulou
Loulou Players official website: http://www.loulouplayers.com/
