Simply Jeff

A groundbreaking L.A. DJ (originally known as DJ Spinn) and collaborator with both hip-hop pioneer Afrika Bambaataa and everyone’s favorite gangsta, Snoop Dogg, Simply Jeff is among Southern California’s most prominent ambassadors to the global dance-music scene. He brings the funk to the world party, maintaining a strong sense of his own roots while mixing with everyone else in the room.

Throughout Breakbeat Massive, Simply Jeff reconciles the emotionally remote yet technologically visionary tendencies of Euro dance music with the sublime virtues of funk. It works, and not necessarily because of any of the mix’s apparent gee-whiz qualities. Sure, this is amazing electronic music, with lightning-fast keyboard riffs breaking apart between the beats; g-funk synthesizer emerging from the depths of the mix for one mothership takeoff after another; sirens, blurts, beeps and whistles all working together like Latin percussion in a heated jam; all of these sounds taking on different tones and dimensions at the whim of a master percussionist. But all that spice isn’t what makes this album so exciting.

Instead, Simply Jeff’s strength is in his self-control. The breakbeat is a relaxed, syncopated style that is seldom hurried by the chaos that surrounds it. Jeff’s laid-back style ratchets up the tension in the music, making listeners anticipate each percussive break with heightened expectation and urgency. The weight of the swing is arguably the essence of funk, and Jeff’s swing is longer and harder than most. When he does pick up speed, it’s breathtaking, but it’s the slow moments that really satisfy.