// A small update on the 3rd release of the series, which continues to be available at Karaoke Kalk and for which the taz once again wrote about him (German article). – Jeff Özdemir & Friends will be released on 18.06.2021 //
Jeff Özdemir’s real name is Adem Mahmutoglu and, like so many others, he is a Berliner by choice. His life is mainly shaped by music and for at least one of his music projects he sometimes uses the name Jeff Özdemir. Before moving to Berlin, he lived for a long time in Bremerhaven and, to a certain extent, in his former record shop, the 33 rpm store. I bought my first records there about 22 years ago, records that weren’t just for playing at home. They were mainly needed during the time when I was trying my hand at DJing, mostly for parties.
I realise now that Adem’s pre-selection helped shape my musical tastes. At the time, I was certainly convinced that it was just my brilliant understanding of music that kept the record box so well sorted. Obviously, the work of selecting records was a very different one back then and I was correspondingly dependent on the record shop. There was no Beatport, no Shazam. A lot of time might pass before I knew the name of a record I had heard somewhere, and then getting hold of it was the real problem. In the days of dubplates and white labels, it took forever for one of these records to come out, if it came out at all.
In the later transition period from vinyl to digital, I had some heated discussions with Adem about how good the internet was going to be for musicians (my opinion) and the dangers of the internet through illegal downloads (his opinion). This often happened over a cup of tea, so a visit to his shop was not only an invitation to look for records, but also often used for extensive conversations. I miss the environment that his record shop gave me back then. But every now and then I visit Adem in Berlin and reminisce for a while.
Adem felt like one of the last people to leave Bremerhaven. But he was also one of those who always wanted more than the city could give. Many creative people left early, looking for what was missing. Adem seems to have found it in Berlin. He runs his record shop there in much the same way as he did in Bremerhaven. However, the events and releases he organises are now more frequent and extensive. One of these releases is Jeff Özdemir and Friends, which, with its first edition, is also a recapitulation of times past. Tracks like Der Typ ist Fett dabei by Edwyn Tokyo were re-released on the compilation in 2015. But I still remember Adem and Frank playing it for me in the shop.
In the almost 30 years that Adem has been active, he has built up a network from which the compilations now benefit. Some of the bands on the first edition are from his time in Bremerhaven. Other tracks show how Adem has developed in the meantime. In my opinion, Allein mit dem Dualismus stands for this particularly well.
The second edition, released in 2017, follows the same path, but is also much fresher, with new collaborations. Adem was unnecessarily modest and wished me a lot of fun with the bad investment, even questioning the third edition. But I think that the self-proclaimed Bill Gates of the Bontempi organ continues to offer an interesting spectrum that shies away from being confined to a single genre, and the supposed focus on him as Jeff Özdemir does no harm either. On the contrary, it is through him that interesting musicians and music I am not always familiar with come within my reach.
Jeff Özdemir and Friends Vol. 1 (2015) and Vol. 2 (2017) are available for preview and purchase on Bandcamp (Vol. 1) and Bandcamp (Vol. 2). I also recommend a visit to his 33 rpm store at Wrangelstraße 95 in Berlin, where you can buy them too. Or directly from the Karaoke Kalk label.
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Further reading (all in German):
Jeff Özdemir & Friends at Phonanza FM
Voll am Start, der Mann at the taz
Über den Plattenrand hinaus at Renk Magazin
Hat man da Töne? at Zeit Online (free, but unfortunately requires login)
And an interview I did with Adem in 2008 for the short-lived magazine bookup:
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