Dj Gabriel

A professional DJ for more than fifteen years, DJ Gabriel is one of the pioneers that has shaped Malaysia’s dance music scene. As a promoter and DJ he has promoted and played many of the country’s landmark parties, sharing the decks with DJs like Carl Cox, Roger Sanchez, Sasha both at home and abroad. Today, Gabriel's experience as a world-class DJ spans Asia, North America and Europe. When not shuttling between residencies throughout South-East Asia Read more on Last.fm …read full bio

A professional DJ for more than fifteen years, DJ Gabriel is one of the pioneers that has shaped Malaysia’s dance music scene. As a promoter and DJ he has promoted and played many of the country’s landmark parties, sharing the decks with DJs like Carl Cox, Roger Sanchez, Sasha both at home and abroad. Today, Gabriel's experience as a world-class DJ spans Asia, North America and Europe. When not shuttling between residencies throughout South-East Asia, he is polishing his production chops for a forthcoming album that combines dance music's diversity into the potent tribal tech-house brew that has become his signature sound. Born in 1972, Gabriel Chong began his DJ and music career at the age of 15. As a dextrous teenager, he represented his native Singapore as the youngest-ever participant at the 1988 DMC World Championships in London. His success gave him the confidence to move to Kuala Lumpur, the capital of neighbouring Malaysia. Quickly realising that Malaysia’s music scene lacked coherence he founded a promotion agency called Tempo, credited by many for introducing a previously unheard music to the country: House. With Tempo's parties plugging Malaysia into the booming global club network of the late '90s, Gabriel had established himself as a vital link between South-East Asia and the rest of the world. Soon, DJs like Jon Carter, Carl Cox, Sasha and Ritchie Hawtin, many who had barely heard of Malaysia, began making Kuala Lumpur an essential stop on their tours, and of course, sharing the decks with Gabriel at groundbreaking Malaysian clubs like Movement and Carbon. Gabriel's links to the global scene soon led to dates at intimate clubs like San Francisco's Red Melon parties as well as giant venues like Berlin's Casino. An astute crowd-reader with precise technical skills, Gabriel is renowned for big room peak sets where he creates a driving techno soundtrack layered with tribal percussion. For smaller rooms he takes the mix deeper with warm, straight-up house. An ambitious and progressive experimentalist, he has developed a number of collaborative outfits with keyboardists, vocalists and percussionists, including international artists like Haze, that constantly push the limits of club performance. This versatility is naturally reflected in the studio where Gabriel’s has developed a production signature of tribal tech-house infused with dreamy atmospherics. In his continuing quest to break down barriers, the end of 2006 sees the release of Malaysia’s most anticipated record of the year, a collaboration between Gabriel and one of the country’s leading singers, Camelia. Fusing straight-edged pop tunes and dancefloor dynamics the release looks set to add a new twist to Malaysia’s notoriously conservative pop industry. It’s all part of Gabriel’s efforts to promote new Malaysian music talent. Through his packed residencies and nights at clubs like Zouk Kuala Lumpur (the sister club of the renowned Zouk Singapore) he is able to expose young jocks to capacity crowds. A stint as co-presenter of the Zouk Recharge radio show (RED104.9FM) – a show featuring mixes, tunes and interviews from superstar DJs and forthcoming talent – helped him to increase the profile of local DJs and producers and to find them a broader audience. It’s this knowledge of the music scene and his ability to tailor sets to perfectly match an audience that has seen Gabriel in constant demand at launches and events by brands including Volvo, Ford, Baume & Mercier, Mambo, Versace, Giorgio Armani, Hugo Boss, Zegna, Guinness, and Malaysian Fashion Week. Which all contributes to a simple truth: whether as a DJ, promoter or producer, Gabriel has earned a deserved reputation for delivering the music that matters. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.

User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License and may also be available under the GNU FDL.

…shrink me down again