In the past years, the multi-instrumentalist, composer, producer and music enthusiast Jeff Özdemir had been focusing on organising the Live-Mixtape series in Berlin, inviting numerous artists to join him on stage for every single event. However, the year 2020 put an end to this for all the painfully obvious and obviously painful reasons. Undeterred, he instead put together the third instalment of the »Jeff Özdemir & Friends« series, working with singers, musicians and groups such as Knarf Rellöm & DJ Patex, F.S. Blumm, Joanna Gemma Auguri, Elke Brauweiler and Elmer Kussiac for an 18-track … Now, is this a compilation or an artist album? Well, why just either this or that when it can just be both at once? This is »Jeff Özdemir & Friends Vol. 3« after all, emphasis on »&«.

Released on Karaoke Kalk like its two predecessors from the years 2015 and 2017, respectively, »Jeff Özdemir & Friends Vol. 3« sees the man behind Kreuzberg’s 33rpm record store and the 33rpm Records label showcase his qualities as a people remixer, songwriter and versatile musician. He put together a collection of groovy tunes picking up on funk and afrobeat rhythms, introspective ballads, a musically channeled punk attitude, shoegaze sentiments, spoken word passages, drones, glockenspiel sounds, seriously fun experimentation and much more. Just like on the cover artwork – courtesy of Marion Eichmann, Özdemir’s favourite visual artist – everything here seems to discreetly exist for itself while being tightly connected to everything else at same time.

While artists like Ertan Doğancı, Désolé Léo, eng°n, F.S. Blumm and Zap have been long-term collaborators of Özdemir and were featured on previous instalments of the »Jeff Özdemir & Friends« series, new faces and forces also enter the mix. The melancholic »Love Letters« for example marks the first (though hopefully not last) collaboration with singer Joanna Gemm Auguri, while Knarf Rellöm & DJ Patex’s appearance has been dreamt of collectively but hasn’t been fully realised until now.

Whether it’s Désolé Léo’s French crooner soul, the lo-fi synth pop song »Bored« featuring former Commercial Breakup singer Elke Brauweiler or the many different sounds and styles presented under the name Jeff Özdemir: no decision is ever made between either that or this musical direction, but all are being joyfully enjoyed together. Thus, throughout its 70 minutes, the stylistic diversity of »Jeff Özdemir & Friends Vol. 3« does not once border on randomness. Instead, these sometimes very different songs are marked by a shared atmosphere – a direct result of these very different musicians approaching their studio time together less as a chance to make music but more of a chance to carefully listen to and interact with each other.

Just like you’d expect it from someone deeply connected with the local music community who also happens to run a record store, Özdemir is also the kind of person who’ll hand you the worn copy of a record he has just fished out from the bargain bin because he knows about its potential to change your life. The contributions by Vackrow (»Kleistpark«), Gebrüder Teichmann’s old band BeigeGT (»Disco«), and Otto von Bismarck (»Zu viele Erinnerungen«, produced by The Whitest Boy Alive’s Daniel Nentwig) do not even feature Özdemir, but are simply musical pearls that were (almost) lost in the shuffle of music history and unearthed for this very special occasion. That’s just what friends do, don’t they?

https://jeffoezdemir.com/

Angekündigt und abgefeiert wurde der Weltuntergang von Prince zwar schon im Jahr 1982, doch sein „1999“ lief selbstverständlich vor allem vor der Jahrtausendwende rauf und runter. Zeit also, zwanzig Jahre nach dem dann doch nicht über die Bühne gegangenen Ende der Erde dieses perfekte Lied dazu erneut zu feiern. Wie im Business gang und gäbe, wird dies unter anderem mit dem ein oder anderen Remix zelebriert. Weit interessanter ist jedoch, was drei Musiker aus Berlin als Hommage an des Prinzen musikalische Version des Armageddon veröffentlichen.

Über Monate haben die Berliner Sängerin und Musikerin Elke Brauweiler (u.a. Paula) und der Komponist, Musiker, Produzent und Labelbetreiber Jeff Özdemir an einer Fassung des Liedes gearbeitet, die sich nicht duckend dem Original anbiedert, sondern eine ganz eigene Intensität anbietet. Brauweiler und Özdemir rudern in ihrem „1999“ durch eine der aktuellen Zeit angemessen intensiven Version, die leicht und federnd und gleichzeitig beschwörend und hypnotisch durch das Ende der Welt fließt.
Während der luftige Discobeat ihres Freundes, dem Produzenten Rimini Sunset, allem zugrunde liegt, streut Brauweiler mit ihrer klaren, wiedererkennbaren Stimme etwas Hoffnung auf die minimalistische Endzeit.

I was dreaming when I wrote this,
Forgive me it goes astray

Dem Meister würde es gefallen.

Berlin-based musician and mass collaborator, Jeff Özdemir, is back with a new double vinyl and this time he’s gone for gold. With cinematographic soundscapes, thick bass lines, tangible percussion, eerie keys and charming vocals, this synergetic masterpiece treads the boundaries between jazz, Gameboy sounds, chanson, psychedelic desert, soul, minimal, seventies pop, dub, electronic and classical music with a hint of a John Carpenter-esque style to boot. Rooted in the past but spanning to the future, Jeff Özdemir & Friends vol. 2 refuses to be pigeon-holed into any one decade or genre, transcending these categories without destroying them. Through deep experimentation, Turkish-born multi-instrumentalist Özdemir and his circle of friends have managed to create their own unique sound whilst remaining changeable and varied. Much like the collaborators of the project itself, each song has its own personality drawing from the various corners of the musical universe and joining together to create a new world. The tracks oscillate between Özdemir’s solo-work, to dual collaborations, to group projects and include names such as F.S. Blumm, Andrew Pekler, Halloumi Express, Sonja Polligkeit, Benjamin Wild and Dizzy from Rotation. Drawing from their creators’ diverse backgrounds the songs incorporate multi-cultural, multi-linguistic elements including French, Japanese, Turkish and Portuguese. Despite its wide scope this double-vinyl – also available as a CD and mp3 download – and its catchy, lingering melodies is both cerebral and accessible. Jeff Özdemir & Friends vol. 2 gives you an insight into Özdemir’s world which he centres around his record store, 33rpm Store, in the heart of Berlin Kreuzberg. It is through this hub that he and his friends join together to discuss, listen to and, of course, make music. So have a peek through the window of Jeff Özdemir’s mind and enter once again into a universe of sound both familiar and entirely new…

Juliette Wallace

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https://soundcloud.com/33rpm-records/

Check out the 360° video by Jeff Özdemir.

Presented here is the next chapter in the history of Faruk Green’s keyboarder and founding member JEFF ÖZDEMIR… a compilation of soulful, pop & electronic inspired music.

Jeff Özdemir, multi-instrumentalist, composer, producer and owner of the “33rpm Store”, an independent record shop in Berlin Kreuzberg, also runs the label 33rpm Records with some of his musician friends.
The record store has become part of Özdemir’s own musical education, a place to experiment and discover new sounds and new bands.
Over the years, his broad exposure to different eras & genres of music has had a strong influence on what he produces.
And it’s these kinds of influences you’ll hear on this double vinyl, in the chords, rhythms, atmospheres, production styles, and sound aesthetics.

Tune in to JEFF ÖZDEMIR & FRIENDS and you’ll find a colourful mix of all decades, continents, fierce micro-grooves, tempos, genres and genders.
Released on this album are solo tracks he’s been working on for quite some time now, plus a handful of tracks done with collaborators and friends – hits Jeff is deeply in love with.

Faruk Green, Jeff Özdemir and the whole local urban music scene around them are geographically located between the German cities of Bremerhaven, Hamburg and Berlin, but the dots connect across the globe reaching all the way to Vienna, Metz, Helsinki, Istanbul, Minneapolis, Michigan and Ghana.

This compilation is an eclectic and unique album for people who like jazz-funk, indie, the German language, strings, record stores, vinyl, movie soundtracks, Moogs and pop vocals.

Sit back and enjoy the ride with JEFF ÖZDEMIR & FRIENDS. And rest assured, volume two is already being worked on as you listen.

https://www.facebook.com/JeffOezdemir/

https://soundcloud.com/33rpm-records/

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