Josh Abrahams

Puretone

Josh Abrahams, c. 2000
Background information
Also known as Puretone, The Pagan, Bassliners
Born 1968 (age 48–49)
Melbourne, Australia
Years active 1990–present
Labels Shock, Worldwide Ultimatum, Festival, EMI
Associated acts Havana Moon, Future Sound of Melbourne, Amiel Daemion, Davide Carbone, s:amplify

Josh Abrahams (born 1968 in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia) is an Australian musician who emerged from the underground dance music scene in the early 1990s. He has performed and recorded under the stage name Puretone, and is also known as The Pagan and Bassliners.

Abrahams is a composer, producer, bass guitarist and electronica artist and has worked as a writer, music director and producer on albums and film soundtracks, and in television and theatre.[1] His single, "Addicted to Bass", with singer Amiel Daemion, peaked at No. 15 in February 1999.[2]

Biography

Abrahams was born in 1968 in Melbourne and started as a bass guitarist and singer in covers band, Havana Moon in 1990.[1] Abrahams formed the techno group, Future Sound of Melbourne (FSOM) with drum and bass producer Davide Carbone and acid house DJ Steve Robbins. They released 12" singles on the Shock Records imprint, Candyline Records. Future Sound of Melbourne also released tracks on Belgium's underground dance-music label, Two Thumbs Records, with the Thomas Heckmann remix of their track "Welcome" featured on the inaugural IF? Records compilation Zeitgeist which was released internationally through Nova Zembla. The Heckmann remix was re-released in 2008 through Sydney-based netlabel, Hypnotic Room. Future Sound of Melbourne won the ARIA Award for "Best Dance Release" for their Chapter One album in 1996.[3] During this period Abrahams also released several dance singles under various artist names including The Pagan and Bassliners.

In 1995, Abrahams left Future Sound of Melbourne to become a solo artist,[4] and signed to Carl Cox's label, Worldwide Ultimatum, releasing his techno album The Satyricon to critical acclaim.[1] The album did not chart into the ARIA Top 50,[2] although a track from the album, titled "The Joker", appeared on the soundtrack for the film Hackers.[5]

After briefly creating a pop band called The Edison Project and releasing a single, "Don't Be Afraid", Abrahams returned to solo work and signed to Festival Records in Australia in 1997. Film director Baz Luhrmann became interested in Abrahams' work, and asked him to co-produce some tracks for Luhrmann's album Something for Everybody, one of which became the 1998 UK No. 1 single, "Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen)". Abrahams' chart success continued in 1999 when he teamed with singer Amiel Daemion on the Australian platinum selling single "Addicted to Bass", which peaked at No. 15 on the ARIA singles chart. The associated album Sweet Distorted Holiday, which peaked in the top 50 on the ARIA albums chart, was released in 1999. The second single, "Headroom", another collaboration with Daemion, peaked outside the ARIA Top 100, while "Thrillseeker", the third single was released as a promotional single in Australia. Abrahams also had top 50 chart success in New Zealand with "Addicted To Bass", "Thrillseeker" and Sweet Distorted Holiday.[6] Abrahams set the record for number of ARIA nominations for an artist on an independent label that year, getting six nods, for record of the year, best male artist, best independent release, best dance artist album, best video, and best engineer. He ended up winning two ARIAs, for Best Dance Album and Best Independent Release. In 2001, Abrahams added to his producer credits by producing the platinum selling single "Lovesong" and the gold selling album Audio Out for Daemion.

Puretone

Puretone was used as an alias by Abrahams to avoid confusion with similarly named US record producer, Josh Abraham. As Puretone, Abrahams released "Addicted To Bass" internationally, which resulted in the single peaking at No. 2 in the UK Singles Chart in 2002. Abrahams assisted Amiel Daemion in her solo career in Australia, in which she gained quite some success. He then released another single in the UK, called "Stuck in a Groove", once again featuring Daemion on vocals, which peaked at No. 26. Puretone released one full-length album, Stuck in a Groove.

Film, television and theatre

Abrahams continued his creative collaboration with Baz Luhrmann in 2001 when he co-produced the Moulin Rouge film soundtrack. In 2002, Abrahams composed and produced original music for a feature film by Paul Currie called One Perfect Day, set in the Melbourne dance music scene. Also in this year, Abrahams remixed songs for John Farnham and Icehouse. In 2003, Abrahams wrote and produced the original music score for the movie One Last Ride, produced by Academy Award-winning director Ang Lee. He began composing music for television commercials, such as the 'Go For It Girl’ campaign for Portmans clothing, a song entitled "Melt with You" for Baileys Irish Cream and the LG technology campaign. In 2005, TV jingles were Abrahams' main focus, along with writing more of his own original music. In 2007 he composed, arranged and recorded large-scale orchestral jingles for a series of three TV commercials for Ask Dot Com, in 2009 he arranged and recorded a version of "My Favourite Things" for a series of Dove TV commercials, and in 2010 he composed arranged and recorded the theme song for the global Tourism Australia advertising campaign.

Abrahams also has a career in theatre. He was the music director and pianist in The Soubrettes Cabaret Tingel Tangel at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2004. He spent July and August 2006 running the night-club in the first Spiegeltent (a travelling European music and theatre venue) to tour in the USA, then returned to this venue as music director for the theatrobatic show "Desir", premiering in the New York Spiegeltent in August 2008.

Recent activity

In 2008, Abrahams teamed up with Kaz James, co-writing and producing seven songs for his debut solo album If They Knew.

In 2009 Abrahams reunited with his old techno buddy Davide Carbone. Together they formed the music production house s:amplify. Under this new moniker Abrahams and Carbone teamed with Carl Cox to co-write and co-produce Cox's artist album All Roads Lead to the Dancefloor,[7] released in 2012. This trio also provided remixes for Moby, Miguel Bosé[8] and Gilles Peterson, among others. Recently, as part of s:amplify, Abrahams and Carbone provided complete sonic branding packages for Melbourne TV network Channel 31 (Australia), and the Melbourne public transport company Metro Trains Melbourne, as well as composing music for Tourism Australia,[9] Alienware,[10] and the International Cricket Council. s:amplify have also produced several tracks for various artists including the recent cover version of Wuthering Heights by Robyn Loau.[11]

In 2011, s:amplify were featured on the front cover of the April issue of Music Tech magazine[12] and released two sound design packs through Loopmasters which have received several positive reviews.[13] Currently, s:amplify is providing the sound design for the forthcoming Japanese synthesizer KDJ One[14] and have recently been appointed musical directors for the City of Sydney New Year's Eve fireworks show.[15] The 2011/2012 12-minute NYE Fireworks show on Sydney Harbour showcased 24 Australian songs including original composition from Abrahams and Carbone.[16]

Since around 2015, he has been working with Johnny "Galvatron" as part of the video game studio Beethoven & Elephant to compose music for The Artful Escape.[17]

Discography

Albums
Singles

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 McFarlane, Ian (1999). "Encyclopedia entry for 'Josh Abrahams'". Encyclopedia of Australian Rock and Pop. St Leonards, NSW: Allen & Unwin. ISBN 1-86508-072-1. Archived from the original on 3 August 2004. Retrieved 3 June 2009.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Australian (ARIA) chart peaks:
  3. 1 2 "ARIA Awards – History: Winners by Year 1996: 10th Annual ARIA Awards". Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA). Archived from the original on 14 December 2007. Retrieved 30 May 2009.
  4. ↑ "Puretone > Overview". allmusic. Macrovision. Retrieved 3 June 2009.
  5. ↑ "Hackers (1995) – Soundtracks". Internet Movie Database (IMDb). Retrieved 3 June 2009.
  6. 1 2 3 4 "Discography Josh Abrahams (New Zealand)". charts.org.nz. Retrieved 3 June 2009.
  7. ↑ "DMC World". Retrieved 23 August 2011.
  8. ↑ "Terra Noticias". Retrieved 23 August 2011.
  9. ↑ Canning, Simon (31 May 2010). "The Australian". The Australian. Retrieved 23 August 2011.
  10. ↑ "PC Authority". Retrieved 23 August 2011.
  11. ↑ "Robyn Loau". Retrieved 23 August 2011.
  12. ↑ "Music Tech Magazine Interview". Archived from the original on 24 July 2011. Retrieved 23 August 2011.
  13. ↑ "MTM s:amplify review". Retrieved 23 August 2011.
  14. ↑ "Engadget". Retrieved 23 August 2011.
  15. ↑ "City of Sydney". Retrieved 23 August 2011.
  16. ↑ "Sydney Morning Herald". The Sydney Morning Herald. 30 December 2011. Retrieved 13 January 2012.
  17. ↑ Frank, Allega (30 March 2016). "WHY ONE DEV GAVE UP THE ROCK STAR LIFE FOR A KICKSTARTER PROJECT". Polygon. Retrieved 17 June 2017.
  18. ↑ "ARIA Report 569" (PDF). Archived from the original on 21 February 2002.
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