Jordan Arts

Jordan Arts (born 1988) is a New Zealand pop keyboard player, songwriter, vocalist, programming specialist and member (with Sam McCarthy) of the duo Kids of 88.

Early life

Arts was brought up in Auckland in the suburb of Onehunga. He was educated at St Peter's College. Arts and McCarthy met at St Peter's and quickly realised that they were on the same wavelength. They were in the same English class. McCarthy has said: "As an icebreaking exercise we were told to bring in our favourite song. Everyone brought in Limp Bizkit, but the thing that linked Jordan and myself is that we were wanky enough to bring in Jimi Hendrix songs. We were both trying to be as cool as possible so we rummaged through our parents' CD collection as opposed to our own".[1] With McCarthy, David Wong, Graham Scherer and Michael Pomare, Arts was a member of "Incursa", a St Peter's College band which won the Smokefreerockquest in 2004.[2]

Career

Arts and McCarthy later formed Kids of 88.[3] In releasing the first Kids of 88 album, Sugarpills, McCarthy said that the duo tried to produce a variety of material rather than just the familiarly slutty "My House" and "Just A Little Bit".[3] Their style is broadly a fusion of electro-pop and 1980s style dance music. They describe it as "a cross between a late 1980s police drama intro theme and a sophisticated super hussy".[1] A reviewer has said "while reminiscent of early 80s synth pop, they aren't a direct copy of their antecedents. There's also a touch of 2010 punk swagger and adrenaline, where dance can't ignore what's been achieved in R&B and hip-hop".[4] McCarthy and Arts produced the album themselves and worked with a simple technical set-up out of a bedroom.[5] As far as their respective roles are concerned, McCarthy has described himself as "more of a classic songwriter" with Arts "hunched over computer, a technical, stumble-across-aloop, get-inthere-and-make-some-beats kind of guy".[3] At the 2010 New Zealand Music Awards, Kids of 88 won "Single of the Year" and (with Tim Van Dammen) "Music Video of the Year" for their single Just a Little Bit.[6]

Notes

  1. ^ a b Vicki Anderson, "Kids of 88", The Press, 13 August 2010, p. 14.
  2. ^ Smokefreerockquest past winners
  3. ^ a b c Tom Fitzsimons, "The kids are alright", Dominion Post, 12 Aug 2010, p. 3.
  4. ^ Tom Cardy, "Album of the Week", Dominion Post, 26 August 2010, Edtn 2, p. 11.
  5. ^ Jule Scherer, "Keeping it real", The Southland Times, 21 August 2010, p. 1.
  6. ^ "Gin and Stan win big at NZ Music Awards". One News. 7 October 2010. http://tvnz.co.nz/entertainment-news/gin-and-stan-win-big-nz-music-awards-3825713. Retrieved 8 October 2011.