‘Everyone knew who he was’: James Hamilton, the ‘eccentric aristo’ who catalysed British club culture
He outed Norman Cook as Fatboy Slim, imported turntablism and made BPM a staple of dance journalism. Pete Tong and Paul Oakenfold remember a pivotal figure
Norman Cook can remember the first time he met James Hamilton very clearly. “He was enormous,” he laughs. “Enormous and very well-spoken, called everyone ‘dear boy’, quite camp. He looked so … unlikely. Not a party animal, not into anything apart from dance music and the vibe and the culture of it all. Not interested in being cool, he was like, ‘it’s OK to be nerdy as long as you really know your music’, but I think he really enjoyed the fact that every club he went to, everyone would know who he was and they were all going to tell him some gossip or give him a record.”
Moreover, Cook remembers their meeting because James Hamilton had caused him a whole world of trouble. It was the 80s, a decade before Cook became Fatboy Slim, superstar DJ and multi-platinum producer of countless dancefloor hits: he was still the bass player in indie band the Housemartins, who had quietly put out his first solo single – “a kind of cut-up rap record called The Finest Ingredients” – under a pseudonym, DJ Megamix, further masking his identity by trying to make the 12in look like an American import.
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