About K69 (Formerly known as DJ-K)
Summary
DJ-K - K69 Established; 1991
Clubs / Events played 1990-2025: 1600+
Whore House records Best-selling artist 2021-23
Track Releases; 300+
Compilation Albums featured on: 400+
Artist Peak Ranking Beatport House Hype: 5th in the world
Artist Peak Ranking Beatport House: 54th in the world
Radio 1 / Muzik Magazine Award Winner 1998, Runner up 1999
Essential Mix Radio One 1999
Cleveland City Records 2nd Best Selling artist 2021-25
Vamos Music Best Selling artist 2017
K69 (Formerly known as DJ-K), started his journey in the late 80’s with a trip to Ibiza in 1987. Hypnotized by the mix of Balearic beats and house music under the Stars at Amnesia with Alfredo on the decks he was entranced and curious all at the same time.
The following 3 years Ibiza was his choice of destination, networking and grabbing the odd chance to get into a DJ booth and watch how the crowd reacted to different genres and the pace of music. This set the wheels in motion for a 3 year wait for some technics decks. Enter the early 1990, and K Was seduced by rave culture.
The lightbulb moment came whilst watching an amazing performance by Dream Frequency at a night called Lucarave. There was the lead guy (Ian Bland) hyping the crowd up with euphoric sounds blasting from the speakers. K momentarily stopped dancing to soak up what was happening to himself and the crowd. He had been mixing on technics for 6 months or so at this point but that was the night he decided he wanted to be on the decks orchestrating what was happening on the dance-floor. From then on Dave Graham would let him warm up and get his first taste of playing in a club. By 1994 he had his first residency in a local club called Storeys and a night called Dance Kraze and was lucky enough to play a few guest slots at various bars and clubs out in Ibiza including IBZ Nightlife and Es Paradis. Regular guest slots followed until 1997 when he entered Muzik Magazine's "Bedroom Bedlam" DJ competition and won the mix of the month. A few months later he was announced with 5 other DJ’S making waves on the club scene as the “Cream of bedroom bedlam” and became a resident on the Muzik Magazine tour as well as becoming a regular on the UK club scene at the likes of legendary brands Gatecrasher, Progress, Sundissential, The Ministry of sound and The Red Box (Dublin). He was also booked to play the famous Limelight club, Twilo in New York and the Shadow lounge in Miami.
Following some great advice from his idol and somewhat mentor, Tony De Vit, who he was regularly booked to warm up for, he tweaked his style slightly creating his own sound and set-building technique, and refused to play one style. The only thing that mattered was keeping the dance-floor rocking and by doing so he stamped his own brand on the scene.
At the time his fusion of energetic house pumping house beats with a harder edge and euphoric trance resulted in a flood of bookings in the UK and Europe playing regularly in Ibiza and beyond and in the mid to late 90’s and was rewarded for his efforts with a Radio 1 / Muzik Magazine award appearing on Judge Jules radio 1 show for an interview. A roller coaster of high-profile gigs followed with many highlights including the cherry on the cake, at the biggest club in the world in Ibiza. Privelage (Now UNVRS) in 2001.
As the scene adopted a more commercial sound in 2002 “K” took a step in the opposite direction, reinventing his sound into a more progressive and tribal house-based sound as trance fell out of favour with the masses. Whilst the change closed some doors, bigger ones opened, resulting in the biggest gig of his career playing at Serbia’s “Exit Festival” in July 2002. Perched 30 ft up in a DJ Booth in a castle overlooking the Danube River. He played the sunrise set between 5-7 am to over 12,000 clubbers as the sun rose to reveal a sight he would never forget. A sea of hands in the air as far as the eye could see. This was what it was all about, those once-in-a-lifetime moments.
After a few years' break to focus on his family, he re-emerged in the Rave documentary “One More” (The Definitive History of UK clubbing) with video footage of him on the decks at Progress-Derby and Sundissential-Birmingham (available worldwide on DVD). In 2014 he was approached by the biggest internet radio network in the world, “DI.FM” and “Rhythm Nation,” the brand and radio show was born, focusing on his early musical influences. Within months, his show was regularly hitting No.1 in the Mixcloud trending charts and consistently the DI.FM’’s “Old School Rave” channel’s No.1 show with over 30,000 listeners each month. It didn’t take long for other radio stations to show an interest, and he took Rhythm Nation to 5 other radio brands, clocking up over 100 consecutive Mixcloud top 10’s.
2017 saw a new dawn for DJ-K as DI.FM convinced him to return and reinvent his successful show Rhythm Nation for today’s dance floors. Not doing things by halves, DJ-K used this new opportunity to also start producing under a new alter ego, “K69” was born. He set himself a goal to make a couple of tracks, which saw him team up with Ian Bland of Dream Frequency, 24 years on from that night in Lucarave, which had a huge influence on his future path. This time however, it was all about making house tracks and learning Ableton production skills. He spent over 50% of his debut year in the Beatport charts and was Vamos music’s No.1 best-selling artist by the end of the year. His 90’s influenced house sound twisted for today’s dance-floors was gathering support from DJ A listers worldwide with regular support from Jon pleased wimmin, Judge Jules, Slipmatt, Victor Simonelli, Todd Terry and many more.
K69 consistently dipped back into the halcyon years of old skool rave music for inspiration and his sound was a huge hit with not only his Rhythm Nation old skool followers but a whole new younger generation , evident as he rocked the Fortress at the Beatherder Festival to some rave reviews on you tube in 2017.
His success continued in 2018 as he moved up the Beatport artist rankings peaking at No.65 alongside the likes of Robbie Rivera, Todd Terry, and other household names following releases on many other labels including Dirty Music, Electroscene,13 Records and Poolside Recordings / Poolside x, Deathstar, Nastyfunk records as well as a label that was to become his spiritual home for music releases: Whore House records which was formed by the mighty Hoxton Whores.
He and now good friend Ian Bland decided to launch “Sublime Recordings” in August 2018. By October, Sublime had achieved 10 chart hits from their first 10 releases and with the success of the label gathering pace and diversifying, Sublime Underground was born to release the cutting-edge fresher underground sounds as he continued to play to regular crowds for the likes Old Skool Widnes, Sonrisa, Progress Underground and Indian Summer. To top off an amazing year, K69 also remixed 6 tracks for legendary U.S. House DJ and Producer Victor Simonelli with “Dirty Games” planting itself in the top 5 for 4 weeks and gaining airplay on worldwide radio including BBC and Defected radio.The Track became the 145th best-selling house track on Traxsource for in 2018.
2019 Saw Sublime and Sublime Underground pick up pace with 5 releases per month and 90% of releases charting in either Traxsource or Beatport. K69’s old skool influenced house sound continued to gain support from big names such as Roger Sanchez, Sam Divine, Don Diablo, Stu Allan and Rob Tissera to name a few which nudged him into the top 100 worldwide Beatstats Beatport artist rankings of all time and following a busy release schedule finished the year ranked No.16 for 2019 after a string of Beatport top 30 hits.
Hitting the ground running in 2020 a collaboration with original ravers Dream Frequency hit the charts not once but twice with Q2020 after releasing an Original followed by a Breaks remix which went top 50. With K69’s fan base growing month on month it saw him perched on top of the pile as Whore House records No.1 best-selling artist by June and bestselling Whore House release with “Got me movin’ and by Dec 2020 had released over 50 tracks in 36 months and included on 150 + compilations. As 2020 drew to a close K69 has reached No.15 in the Beatstats Beatport artists and 27th of all time as his following continues to grow, He has now taken production a step further and started writing lyrics for tracks and teamed of with amazing vocalist Michelle Lawson with their first release shooting up the Beatport chart to No.15 in only 3 days and hitting No.1 in the Funky House chart.
Moving into 2023 K69 Has proven his flexibility moving ahead of the likes of his early inspiration Todd Terry in the Beatport House rankings at No.59 (Nov 2022) and making a huge impact in the House Hype genre sat at No.8 in the world (Nov 2022). His tracks have found themselves into the playlists of all the big hitters and radio station. K69’s monthly 3 hour “One Love” radio show has already proven it’s worth becoming the most streamed and listened to show for OSN Radio in 2022/23 with consecutive mixcloud no.1’s.
2023 Saw K69 take a huge step back in time, disillusioned with the digital music scene he stopped producing digital tracks due to the greed of online stores and streaming services which barely cover his production costs. Instead, he and his partner in crime, Ian Bland of Dream Frequency decided to give vinyl releases a shot. Directly selling to social media follower’s. Initially it was the Bootlegs 2022 which were mash ups K used to do live in his DJ Sets. But there was no cheating here. With the 33 years of Ian Blands production and performance talent they built every track from scratch, then mastered them but giving them their own unique twist. The first release was a huge success selling 478 (As of Jan 24). Not bad for direct sales. The profit went straight back into Bootlegs 2023 and so on. As a result there was a huge boost to DJ Bookings and Remixes for other labels. To date there have been 11 vinyl releases on Sublime Recordings Bootlegs.
K69 played under his first Alias DJ-K from 1991 to 2016 before switching to K69 and a full relaunch as a producer, artist and DJ. As 2025 landed his release tally topped 300 with support from Slipmatt, Shades of Rhythm, Kid Massive, and many of A-List DJs, as well as a rave review from Pete Tong for his remix of Xpansions. K69 has continued to keep a foot in both the Old Skool and New House music camps, releasing on both vinyl and regular Cleveland City releases and remixes. One thing is guaranteed when booking K69 for an event, he always engages with the dancefloor and doesn't disappoint with his DJ sets. His ability to read the dancefloor at different events after 30+ years of playing from New York to Ibiza, Miami to Poland, Serbia to Croatia is 2nd to none.
Beatherder Festival - Ribble Valley, Exit Festival - Novi Sad, Serbia, GUMA - Croatia, Elyx - Croatia, Monegros desert festival - Spain, Mira Festival - Spain, Muenz - Berlin, Rejuvenation - Leeds, UK Gatecrasher-Sheffield , Lucarave-Warrington, Dance Kraze-Widnes, Progress-Derby , Eden – Lincoln, Déjà vu-Hull , Steem-Sheffield ,Ministry of sound – London , Eyecon – Plymouth , Kool Waters – Taunton , Euphoria-Oxford, The Dance Factory-Preston, Global Dance - Guernsey ,Sundissential – Birmingham & Leeds, The Red Box-Dublin, Wobble – Birmingham , The Space – Leeds , The Dance factory –Preston , Ootchy Kootchy – Widnes , Crazy Daisies –Coventry , The Maze –Bristol , Karanga –Bath , The Arches –Sheffield , Fascination - Belfast, Bed-Sheffield, Shimmee –Keele, Bondage – Stafford, Delve Deeper –Sheffield, Club Static – Manchester,, Sonrisa-Liverpool, Progress Underground, Indian Summer Festival - Frodsham, Love2Dance - Preston, Old Skool Widnes, VVHLP – Leeds, The Bibliotic – Dundee, Deja-Vu-Hull, The Arches – Glasgow, Various clubs - Poland, and many more not forgetting his radio shows and appearances on D.I.FM, OSN Radio, Radio 1 and a number of internet stations.
USA ; The Limelight club-New York, The Shadow lounge - Miami, Twilo - New York, Electric Forest - Michigan, Electric Daisy Carnival - Miami.
Ibiza: Mambo, Privilege, Es Paradis, Eden, Kanya (90’s), Plastik, Mango, Amnesia, Itaca, The Star Club (1993/94), Akasha, Ibiza Underground, IBZ Nightlife (1993,94,96)
K69 On Beatport : https://www.beatport.com/artist/k69/602677
K69 On Traxsource : https://www.traxsource.com/artist/376858/k69
K69 On Spotify ; https://open.spotify.com/artist/1rcQ7yOj1kJmeG9RwlDRgP
K69 Bookings : k69@sublimerecordings.com
Website : https://www.sublimerecordings.com/