Paul Oakenfold — Acid House & Trance DJAbout Paul Oakenfold
Paul Mark Oakenfold is an English DJ born in London and originally from Greenhithe, Kent. He began as a bedroom DJ in the late 1970s, moved to New York in 1981 and played his first gig at Rumours in Covent Garden in 1985. Before defining his own dance-music platform, he worked in A&R for Champion Records, signing DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince and Salt-n-Pepa.
An influential 1987 trip to Ibiza led him to co-found the Spectrum acid-house club night at Heaven in Charing Cross, a key route through which he helped popularize acid house in the United Kingdom. In 1988 he founded Perfecto Records, using it as a springboard for new artists. Oakenfold's DJ history includes a guest appearance at the Stone Roses' Spike Island show and more than 50 warm-up dates on U2's 1993 Zooropa and Zoomerang tours.
He created two BBC Radio 1 Essential Mix sets in 1994, including The Goa Mix, and helped bring Goa trance into the mainstream by joining its sounds with related European records. His production work with Steve Osborne on Happy Mondays' Pills 'n' Thrills and Bellyaches earned the 1991 Brit Award for Best Producer. With club nights, label-building, radio mixes and major tour support, Oakenfold's career sits at the meeting point of UK acid house and the global development of trance.