A. Paul
Lisbon, Portugal
A.Paul was born in Lisbon, Portugal in November 1971, and his career started in 1986, although his first contact with music was made at a very early stage, mainly through the hands of his older sister that would regularly listen to disco, funk, and electro sounds in the 70′s. From a music passionate mind, to a national celebrity, A.Paul is today one of the key players of the electronic music scene on a worldwide scale, both as a DJ and as a Producer. His taste, technique and originality made him earn the respect from his peers and most of all the love and devotion from his fans.
After the first years of musical discovery, his talent start to blossom when he was 13, despite living in a country where only a small percentage of people would listen to dance music, he always knew that these infectious rhythms would be on his path. After buying his first decks and mixer, including a couple of years of bedroom practice, he organized a few parties himself and later acquired his first residencies in clubs, through the hand of J.Daniel, who was one of the most respected Portuguese DJs in the 90′s. He was the owner of Question of Time Records, a vanguard record shop and record label, where A.Paul would later release his first record “Juice” a remarkable masterpiece that was played by many top DJs worldwide and licensed to various labels and compilations. He was also invited to be part of the Climacz project, the first after-hours club in Portugal, which was one of the first milestones of his career. The amazing spirit this venue brought to the Portuguese scene is still remembered with great joy and nostalgia by A.Paul himself.
At some point he felt the need to move on and search for new challenges. In 1996, he became part of the Illegal Records project as a techno import manager, was invited to be resident of the best club at that time Kremlin, and later founded his first labels, Squeeze Records and Onh.Cet, which were two relevant projects that helped define and polish his sound. By then he was also already playing quite a lot as free lancer, in a growing market. Portugal was at its peak, in terms of electronic music popularity and A.Paul was playing at one point every weekend on different parts of the country. It was inevitable that he would decide to stick to this option for his career, as opposed to be resident in a club, where he would be more limited in terms of music taste.
In 1997 he joins the X-Club, the most important DJ Agency and party organizer in Portugal. All the top cats were signed to X-Club, and so was A.Paul, first as a supporting artist, and later part of the agency’s top artists too. This period was very important for A.Paul, and his growth was remarkable, because he had the chance to meet and play with all the major techno and house artists in the world. Other projects developed by A.Paul at that time include sound engineering, journalism and also graphic and web design, activities that would become also important on his next projects.
A.Paul was voted best Portuguese techno DJ in 2000, 2001, and 2002 by the readers of Dance Club, the main electronic music media vehicle in Portugal.
A.Paul has never stopped investing and supporting the electronic music community particularly in techno. This is when A.Paul decides to start exploring the international market, due to the changes in the Portuguese scene.1994 to 2000 was monumental time after suffering from the huge decline in quality and quantity of events and musical culture. From the “Paradise Called Portugal” coined years before by international media, Portugal was now a place with a stagnated scene, and techno was probably the first genre to suffer. It was time for change, this crisis lead him to invest his time in a music production career, that was quiet for a few years due to the higher demand for DJ previously. In 2001 he opened Genesis record shop, but it would be a few years later that he created his most successful project to date, Naked Lunch Records which is one of the quality techno labels in the world at the moment. He is also co-owner of MPC Vinyl Distribution, with his long time friends Cisco Ferreira (The Advent) and Michaelangelo, where he also released on his other sister labels The Light, Parallel 125, Dirty Ego, LK and Xtractz.
The last 5 years were indeed the most prolific and successful for career including constant studio and DJ activity. A.Paul has released over 100 vinyl records, several mixed CD compilations released in amazing labels like; Kombination Research, Synewave, Planet Rhyhtm, Italo Business, Pure Sonik, Theory, Mastertraxx, Beat Disaster, Yin Yang, Impact Mechanics, and has remixed artists such as The Advent, Ben Sims, Eric Sneo, Angel Alanis, Damon Wild, DJ T-1000, Virgil Enzinger, Robert Armani, Dave The Drummer, Dj Preach, Mike Humphries, Spiros Kaloumenos, Torsten Kanzler, Bas Mooy, Housemaster Boyz and many more.
Besides his sound of hard, funky, deep bass lines being the gin and juice of techno he is renounced for, he has also been known productions in techouse, minimal and experimental sounds, under several aliases like Loudon Kleer, Luther Miek, Beat Therapy and LK. and last but not least, he is also known for his co-productions with artists like The Advent, Industrialyzer, Michaelangelo, DJ Slot among others.
A.Paul is today one of the most remarkable techno artists in the planet, and his live performance, tracks and sets are acclaimed by a growing number of fans. He has played in events such as Awakenings (Holland), Rock in Rio (Lisbon), Nature One (Germany), Evolve (Canada), Liberty White (Belgium), Decibel (Holand), PACT (Holland), Boomerang (Slovakia), Aquasella (Spain), La Nuit Rouge (France) and in the best european clubs like Tresor (Germany), Fabrik (Spain), Row 14 (Spain), Moog (Spain), U60311 (Germany), Ostgut (Germany), Palazzo (Germany), Poema (Holland), Panama (Holland), Macumba (Spain), Locomia (Portugal), Kadoc (Portugal) and Rocks (Portugal)…
