NederlandsDJ Anne Savage
Biography Anne Savage
The Story Behind the Name
Unless you have been locked up for the last 10 years, you are likely to have heard of dance musics most respected female DJ/Producer/Presenter - Anne Savage. Those whove had their finger firmly on the pulse will have come across the maverick character that is Dumb Blonde - Annes alter ego.
Anne is the personification of dance music - glamorous, fun, up for it and bursting with talent. Her highly evolved energetic sound and honed technical ability combines to astound dance floors from London to LA.
Annes journey to DJ notoriety began back in her hometown of Burnley where she was thrown in at the deep end and asked to become resident at the legendary Angels alongside guest DJ luminaries such as Joey Beltram and Carl Cox. Heavily influenced by the illegal rave scene explosion that took northern England by storm, and formerly being a lead guitarist in the Indie band The 53rd State, it wasnt long before Annes Gibson Les Paul guitar had been traded in for a pair of decks and a 303. Working in the illustrious record shop Eastern Bloc by day and DJing in clubs by night, the start of Annes ascendance to the DJ elite came in the form of a residency at event leaders of their time, Vague and Ark in Leeds alongside Sasha, TWA, Graeme Park and John Digweed.
Anne Savage is a well - loved and prominent fixture on the world DJ circuit and the last 10 years have seen her progress from DJing and producing to become the face of dance music for a generation.
The DJ
As a DJ, Anne is forever pushing boundaries. She is a pioneer in the harder style of dance music and encompasses a hybrid of sounds including techno, tech-trance and anything that packs the dance floor. Year after year, she has been a fixture in DJ Magazines Worlds Top 100 DJs Poll and featured as the only female in the Top 10 Club DJs in Britain by the Independent on Sunday.
Anne is spearheading the global dance onslaught, regularly playing in The Americas, China, Malaysia, Japan, South Africa, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. The Middle East, The Netherlands, Eastern Europe, Russia and Belarus. The festivals are just as regular too including Creamfields, Godskitchens Global Gathering, Wakestock, Digital Festival (Holland), Planet Love, Dance Valley, Q Base, Mystery Land, WEMF, WMC, Homelands and now the newly formed Hi-Fi, Tidy Weekenders and others.
Anne eats, sleeps and breathes djing and her gigs go beyond the clubbing circuit. She has played at the Malaysian Grand Prix in Kuala Lumpur, The Prodigy after party at The Odyssey in Belfast, backstage for Oasis @ Knebworth, and celeb bashes including Paris Hiltons VVIP London perfume launch for fun where she tore up the dance floor and made it onto the pages of OK and the Daily Star!
Not so well publicised are the DJ workshops and seminars that she freely lends her advice to in all areas of dance music.
Dumb Blonde
After over 10 years pounding the hard groove Anne has quietly been ploughing energy into a new project - her house/breaks/electroclash moniker, Dumb Blonde. A string of successful production pieces including Sugar Lips, and We Have The Technology, co- produced with Coburn saw Dumb Blonde a name on everyones lips. Both tracks shot to the dance charts with a number 1 spot for We Have The Technology in the German Cool Cuts with support from Timo Maas, Adam Freeland, Sasha and John Digweed. But dont be fooled by the Dumb Blonde alias, Anne is anything but short of a few marbles, especially when it comes to her production skills. With only a limited pressing, Sugar Lips sold out three times over and both tracks received fantastic reviews from all the dance press. Dumb Blonde has made such an impact she was asked by UKs Streetwise to remix the genre breaking classic Zeros Emit that is due out some time 2006.
The concept of Dumb Blonde is personified in a unique highly stylised animation through visuals available for clubs to use wherever she plays. Dumb Blonde it would seem is poised for a knockout and has appeared selectively at only the finest breakbeat nights in the UK including The Gallery, Chew The Fat, Boomslang, Nu Skool Breaks London, Brightons Supercharged and Rennie Pilgrims legendary breaks night Hum, plus international conquests such as The LA Stock Exchange, Great Stuffs Sound Garden in Munich and tours of China, Australia and Brazil confirmed for 2006.
Look out for the Dumb Blonde website coming soon at www.dumblonde.tv .
The Producer
Anne Savage is much more than a figure behind the decks. She has been producing with numerous class-A acts for many years and is always pushing boundaries, developing new styles and adopting new sounds. Theres a plethora of releases across the board on Automatic, Pitch Control, Tidy, Nukleuz, Good Greef, Traffic, Racetrax, Freakshow, and now JOOF and Detox, for the harder sounds, with electro stable Great Stuff and nuskool breaks label Streetwise taking on every track made to date by Dumb Blonde. The most instantly recognisable being her work as The Tidy Girls in 2000 with fellow DJ Lisa Lashes. FACT: The Tidy Girls EP is still the most requested hard dance EP of all time.
2006 saw The Pod hit the top spot in the Hard Dance Buzz chart and was non- mover for three consecutive weeks. She also held the top 3 slots with her collaborations with Vinylgroover and The Red Hed for most downloaded tracks by trackitdown.net, the UKs largest specialist hard dance download site. These groundbreaking tracks fuse tech-trance and electro, a must for those into hard twisted beats.
As a solo artist Annes euro-tech sounding piece The Do has been snapped up by JOOF - John OO Flemings label. Its getting massive support from a wide spectrum of djs including, Pedro Del Gardo, Marco V, Eddie Halliwell, Scott Project. The Do will be available for digital download later this year. Another first for Anne is a collaboration with Dutch producer Marzz, on Detox Records, Amsterdam called The Unknown
Anne has headed many of the scenes compilation series including Tidys Music For The Harder Generation, The Tidy Girls Annual, and two Extreme Euphoria albums to name a few. Annes Extreme Euphoria 2004 mix sold over 100,000 copies and was one of the best selling from the whole series. Both albums won the Best Compilation award twice at the Hard Dance Awards as voted for by the public.
The Presenter
Not one to rest on her laurels, Anne is making serious n-roads as a presenter. She has become a household name from her stint on Channel 4s Faking It series where she successfully turned a classically trained musician into a DJ in just one month! Anne's input helped the episode win a BAFTA - the only episode to win from that series - shooting her into mainstream fame. So not only is Anne a favourite with clubbers throughout the world but shes also loved by Mums and Dads too! Anne has hosted and presented the Hard Dance Awards ceremony in the UK since their conception three years ago. The awards are presented to the best of the best in hard dance as a recognition for their contribution to the scene. Since Faking It, the presenting offers came flooding in. Anne has worked for the BBC where they flew her to Australia to film a clubbing guide to Melbourne. Anne presented the first-ever televised broadcast of the DJ Mag Top 100 DJs Poll for ITV. During the 2005 awards ceremony, Anne - with full TV crew in tow - hunted down fellow DJs including winner Paul Van Dyk to be interviewed for the show.
As well as appearances on MTVs TRL, MTV Dance, MTV Europe, Rapture and Sky One, Annes extensive knowledge of music was called upon when asked for her input on Channel Fours Music Hall of Fame, commenting on The Prodigy and Simon and Garfunkel! She made it through to the semi-finals of Celebrity Poker, beating celebs such as James Hewitt, Romeo, Ali Mcoist and Jon Thompson. Annes best and most impressive bits from the above are packed together on a DVD showreel - available on request.
The Media
Having no talent go un-recognised, Anne was selected out of hundreds of DJs to host her own specialist weekly show on Ministry Of Sound radio. Anne takes over the waves to play her unique eclectic tastemakers selection of Dumb Blonde and Anne Savage style tuneage every Wednesday from 8-10pm (GMT) turning on listeners in every continent. The show goes Digital from June 5th 2006.
Another feather in Annes cap came in the form of being asked to fill in for Dave Pearce on his popular Sunday night show Dance Anthems on BBC Radio 1, which has an estimated 2.2 million listeners. Also on Radio 1, Anne has stepped-up to the golden decks twice to provide worldwide listeners with an Essential Mix. Both times she provided 2hrs of her trademark tough grooves, with nothing but positive feedback. Anne also appeared on Carl Coxs Global Radio show to an audience of over 1million listeners for an electro-techy Dumb Blonde influenced mix Anne has her fair share of column inches and is regularly featured in Mixmag, DJ, M8, and I-DJ plus other publications worldwide. Anne is an icon to female clubbers everywhere and is in demand outside the music press, transcending the DJ label and appearing in lifestyle publications such as InStyle, Vogue Italia, Sunday Times Style Magazine and Loaded, where she was voted no. 67 in the magazines top 100 sexiest females!!
Savage Online
Annes website provides a wealth of information about all things savage with up-to-date info including her diary, gigs, latest press shots, news, and competition offers such as merchandise and guest list. This is a site for all devoted savages out there - www.annesavage.net .