Simon Harris is a British music producer, DJ, remixer and electronic musician from London predominantly known for his 1988 hit song "Bass (How Low Can You Go?)".[1] He is also the founder of the hip hop label Music of Life and the producer of most of its catalogue of songs.[2]
Harris[3] started as a mobile DJ in the Chigwell, Essex area in 1977 and became known for his mixing. In 1979, he became a DJ at Radio Forest Hospital Radio and promoted disco events featuring Capital Radio DJs. In 1981, Harris met Froggy[4] at one of these events and the two then formed a mixing team which resulted in a succession of releases including the 1987 "Decade Remix" of "You to Me Are Everything" by the Real Thing which became a top 10 UK hit.
Froggy[5] and Harris then decided to launch their own label,[6] Music of Life which was initially distributed by StreetSounds. Then, in 1986, Froggy left and Harris took the direction of Music of Life into hip hop and the label released several early British hip hop tracks by artists including Derek B, the Demon Boyz, Asher D and Daddy Freddy and Einstein but it was the series of breakbeat albums Beats, Breaks and Scratches[7] which included sampled scratches[8] that were released in territories such as Germany and the US. Harris was signed to UK label FFRR[9] by Pete Tong in 1987 with the initial release being Bad on the Mic[10] and remixes for Joyce Sims, Steve "Silk" Hurley, D-Mob feat. Gary Haisman, Sinitta[11] for Simon Cowell's Fanfare label and then also featured in music production magazines describing the sampling technique[12] included on the 1988 FFRR Records album, Bass[13] and numerous radio mixes including Dave Pearce's 'Fresh start to the week' in 1988[14] and covered in UK magazine Hip Hop Connection.[15] In 1992, Harris produced the Ambassadors of Funk[16] with a UK top 10 hit. Harris's association with sampling evolved from vinyl onto the sampling CD[17] in the 1990s and then more recently to digital releases on the Mastermix DJ label,[18] Plus Soda Music in Greece.[19] "Bass (How Low Can You Go?)" was remixed in 2016 by German production team Milk & Sugar.[20] Harris has been involved in many remix projects including the songs "Boogie Nights"[21] and "Gangsters of the Groove" for Heatwave, the first ever official Elvis Presley remix for BMG Rights Management "Bossa Nova Baby",[22] Grace Jones,[23] Prince's No. 1 hit "The Most Beautiful Girl in the World" and more recent DJ productions on Traxsource[24] and the ELROW Music release "This Is Serious" with Morrison which was remixed by Dennis Ferrer[25] and featured successfully on the BBC Radio 1 Friday night dance shows.
| Year | Single | Peak positions | Album | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UK [26] | GER [27] | US Dance [28] | |||||||||||||
| 1987 | "Bad on the Mike" (featuring 3 Boom MC's) | – | – | – | Single only | ||||||||||
| 1988 | "Bass (How Low Can You Go)"[29] | 12 | 47 | 3 | Bass | ||||||||||
| "Here Comes That Sound"[30] | 38 | – | 14 | ||||||||||||
| 1989 | "(I've Got Your) Pleasure Control" (featuring Lonnie Gordon)[31] | 60 | – | 23 | |||||||||||
| "Another Monsterjam" (featuring Einstein)[32] | 65 | – | |||||||||||||
| 1990 | "Ragga House (All Night Long)" (featuring Daddy Freddy) | 56 | – | – | Disturbing the Peace | ||||||||||
| "Don't Stop the Music" (featuring Dina Carroll & Monte Luv) | 84 | – | – | ||||||||||||
| "Time" (featuring Leslie Lyrics) | – | – | – | ||||||||||||
| 1991 | "Louder Than a Shotgun" | – | – | – | Back to the Bass[33] | ||||||||||
| "Summertime" | – | – | – | ||||||||||||
| 1992 | "Rollin' with the Punches" | – | – | – | |||||||||||
| "—" denotes releases that did not chart or were not released. | |||||||||||||||