Sensurreal

Biography

Dutch techno duo Gert-Jan Bijl and Dirk-Jan Hanegraaf possess recorded beneath the titles Marvo Genetic, Sunshower, It’s Thinking, & most frequently as Sensurreal, releasing mostly 12-in . singles (and a set of full-lengths) on such brands as Beam Me personally Up!, Primary, Deviate, & most lately on Kirk Degiorgio’s Op-Art imprint. Sensurreal’s melodic make of funk-fueled techno may audio closest to countryman Jochem Paap’s (of Speedy J, previously of Beam Me Up!, which folded in 1996), but their closest stylistic affinity place most likely with Stasis, Degiorgio’s AS YOU project, and Tag Pritchard and Tom Middleton’s Hyperlink and Reload materials. Sensurreal draw likewise from a rhythmic backbone of funk, jazz, and spirit — a custom tracing with their Rotterdam house, where spirit and R&B will be the pop musics of preference. Although Hanegraaf was raised playing in little garage-rock rings, his waning desire for the restrictions of acoustic centered music was intensified by Bijl’s excitement for Chicago home as well as the encroaching U.K. acid-house motion, to which he continuously uncovered his partner via underground mixtapes and uncommon imports of Marshall Jefferson, Farley Jackmaster Funk, and Mr. Fingertips tunes. Bijl was raised within the outlying Rotterdam suburb of Puttershoek, dabbling in crude tape-deck combining and pirate radio (in case a broadcast radius of two blocks could be known as pirate radio) because the age group of 11. Progressively immersed in digital dance music — both through radio broadcast in addition to Rotterdam’s exploding membership picture — Bijl and Hanegraaf finally started piecing a studio room togther in 1989, toward the finish of senior high school (initial acquisitions included an Alesis MMT 8 sequencer, a Yamaha DX-100 synthesizer, along with a Roland S-10 sampler). Bijl and Hanegraaf’s initial single premiered in 1992 beneath the name Sunlight Shower, and was accompanied by produces on Malego, Deviate, Paap’s Beam Me Up!, and Perfect under the brands It’s Considering, Marvo Hereditary, and (beginning in 1994 making use of their debut LP, To never Tell a Spirit) Sensurreal. The group released two full-length albums on Beam Me Up! (Spirit, along with the follow-up, THE CASUAL Series, sort of live postcard from the group’s 1994 Western european tour) prior to the label folded in 1996, departing the band to look their materials. They eventually arrived with Degiorgio’s Op-Art label in 1997, that your acclaimed three-track EP NewBrandDesign showing up in the label early that season. Bijl in addition has released a good amount of materials being a soloist (the pair’s studio room resides at his house, departing him to noodle during Sensurreal’s downtime), keeping track of EPs under his Gerd alias on Beam Me Up!, Pork, and General Vocabulary among his credits.

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