| A New House
Alumnus DJ Gomi revamps dance music by embracing new technology.
By Andy Barrett '06
Berklee.edu Correspondent
May 11, 2006
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Music synthesis alumnus/DJ Kazuhiko Gomi works the CD turntables at Boston superclub Avalon.
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Photo by Andy Barrett
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A dance remix of Beyoncé's pop smash "Naughty Girl" blasts from the massive sound system of Boston superclub Avalon. The DJ calmly gauges the crowd's reaction from the booth. A Berklee graduate performing for a crush of dancers isn't the rarest of occurrences, but you might not expect to see that alumnus standing in front of a pair of turntables instead of playing guitar or piano. Even more surprising is the fact that these turntables aren't ordinary vinyl decks but "CDJs," which allow the user to manipulate a CD's content as if it were a record. The Beyoncé remix was recently commissioned by Columbia Records, but it was the artist herself who handpicked music synthesis graduate Kazuhiko Gomi, better known as DJ Gomi, to do the honors.
High-profile remixes are nothing new for Gomi. In fact, he has pretty much done them all, having reworked the likes of Madonna, Janet, Whitney, Celine and practically every other surname-less diva to have topped the charts.
"For me, there is no difference between mainstream and underground," Gomi explains. "If I like it, I'll do it." The DJ/producer/keyboardist has carried this philosophy with him since he was a high school student in his native Nagano, Japan. Early on, Gomi's music was dominated by jazz and classical piano studies. His real passion, however, was the then-burgeoning genre known as "house." Unfortunately for the young musician, house was barely recognized in its American birthplace, much less halfway across the world in Japan.
Then one day, Gomi received word that representatives from Berklee would be auditioning Japanese high schoolers for a full scholarship to attend the college. The scholarship had been made possible by Japanese entrepreneur/philanthropist Genko Uchida, who had been funding the successful Berklee in Japan program, which brought Berklee faculty over to teach clinics for young Japanese musicians. Excited by the opportunity to live and study in the country from which house music originated, Gomi auditioned for the scholarship and was picked to be the first Uchida scholar.
Though he attributes his being chosen for the scholarship to "getting lucky," Gomi's talent hardly went unrecognized when he finally reached Boston. His pursuit of cutting-edge electronic music immediately drew the attention of music synthesis professor Richard Boulanger, who was impressed by Gomi's DJing and basic production skills.
"You could tell that Gomi really had a sense of what he was doing and where he wanted to go musically, even very early on when many of his peers barely knew how to turn on all the gear," says Boulanger.
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Gomi poses with Music Synthesis professor Dr. Richard Boulanger.
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Photo by Andy Barrett
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Although Gomi lived and studied in Boston, it was New York that he considered his second American home.
"I loved Boston and the friends that I had here," said Gomi at a recent music synthesis clinic he gave at Berklee, "but the club scene in New York was much better at the time." Gomi found himself making regular weekend trips to the Big Apple, hearing his favorite DJs play all-night sets during the New York club scene's golden age. Gomi eventually began to make friends with many of the DJs and promoters around town, giving them his own mix tapes and early tracks. Eventually, the promoters started responding, and Gomi's name began to appear on party flyers all over New York.
"At first, I was really nervous," remembers Gomi, "but it was so great to be playing alongside DJs who I loved, especially Junior Vasquez. He is the reason why I am doing this today." Vasquez, a legendary New York house DJ/producer, understood the value of Gomi's formal studio training at Berklee and enlisted him to engineer on many of his most successful tracks and remixes.
"My idol was asking me to help him produce the music that I love. I could not believe it," Gomi said.
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Gomi in the mix. |
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Photo by Andy Barrett |
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Upon graduating from Berklee as one of the first music synthesis majors, the natural move for Gomi was to relocate to New York and start his own studio, which is still going strong today. His daily work consists of studio projects for recording artists, plenty of remixes, and a fair amount of commercial sound work, not including his own musical output. With the advent of digital technology, however, Gomi's workflow both in the studio and in the DJ booth has changed drastically.
"There is no win or lose [with digital or analog equipment]. Both are good in some ways and bad in others, I try to use the good parts of both to get the best sound," he says. One analog format that Gomi has abandoned, however, is vinyl. Preferring the more convenient CD format, DJ Gomi can now bring hundreds of tracks with him in the space of several CD wallets, as most all major clubs are now outfitted with CD turntables as well as traditional decks.
"As a house DJ, I don't really scratch," Gomi says. "I don't need a big surface to touch and control, so I don't have a problem playing on CD decks."
Between all of the high-profile studio work, production endorsements, and globetrotting DJ gigs, it would be easy for Gomi to lose sight of the reason he came to Berklee in the first place: music. But Gomi says success isn't that complicated.
"It all comes down to working hard," Gomi says. "That's it. You have to start with an idea and just work until it happens. You really have to live the music 24 hours a day." And as he puts away his CDs later that night at Avalon, the once-packed dance floor now vacated, it doesn't seem like DJ Gomi is having any problems doing just that.
Andy Barrett, a native of St. Louis, Missouri, will graduate this May with a degree in music synthesis.
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