Herb Sundays 17: Trevor Jackson

The archangel of dance music and design. A sumptuous and bold selection of album cuts that speaks to a lifetime in the arts.

Apple / Spotify / Art by Michael Cina

Herb Sundays 17:@trevorjacksonofficial. In a world of chancers, there are very few who can lay claim to Renaissance status in the fields of music, art, and fashion. Trevor Jackson is an artist, designer, DJ, curator, and producer, or in the Kubrick expression, you could call him a taste engine. I first met Trevor in the early 2000s thanks to his enthusiasm for our early releases (I remember how proud I was to see him belting a@matthewdearAudion tune in Barcelona). His label Output (which helped launch artists like@fourtetkieran) was a huge influence on Ghostly as a model for a non-genre label, and his Playgroup alias records and DJ mixes classed up the early 2000s zeitgeist blend of rock and dance. This is all another life after his early sleeve designs and his Underdog musical work. Go forth and google...

Trevor, while being a very DIY dude makes visual work that looks very expensive. It’s luxe but playful, stern but cheeky. Just like his visual sense, his taste in music is crisp and bold. You get the sense that music and design are forms of architecture to Trevor, all grand shapes, volume, and heft. It's a romantic thing.

photos by Chris Tang

For all the grief Trevor gets for being grouchy (or too passionate?), he's one of the most ardent enthusiasts of young artists I've seen, constantly promoting others and loading his@nts_radioshow up with undiscovered sounds.

So for HS17, we get the yearning of The Blue Nile, expansive mid-period Simple Minds, the mechanic lurch of Change, effervescent Mr. Fingers, early Robert Palmer, and even one of my all-time faves, the 15 min "Anglepoised" by Four Tet’s Fridge project (which was released on Output). All tracks drift by on the reel of a tape machine, perfectly paced. It's an honor to get a slice of Trevor's Sunday.