Paul Oakenfold - Richard Norris

Paul Oakenfold is one of the biggest DJs in the world. His rise from South London soul boy to world-conquering DJ is fascinating, inspiring and revealing. Through his story is also told the rise and rise of the multi-million copy industry that is the phenomenon we know as dance music.In 1987, Paul Oakenfold spent several months in Ibiza, where he fell in love with the music he heard there. Using influences from this Ibiza sound, Oakenfold produced the Happy Mondays' album Pills 'n' Thrills and Bellyaches, as well as remixes for artists such as U2, Massive Attack, The Cure, New Order and The Shamen with his production partner Steve Osborne, under the collaborative name 'Perfecto'.In addition to producing records, Oakenfold also of course mixes them. He first started playing in clubs as a teenager and soon built up a reputation as a top party DJ. However, it wasn't until the early 1990s when his name came to be associated with the DJ elite. The reason for this rise to global fame was his adoption of a new breed of dance music called trance, which he'd encountered on the hippy beaches of Goa in India and fused with similar sounding European records to create his own distinct sound. He took this to the mainstream in 1994 with a two-hour set for BBC Radio 1's Essential Mix. This set became known as the Goa Mix and to this day is the most requested broadcast on the BBC radio network.After a short spell as a member of the band Grace, Oakenfold became resident DJ at Liverpool superclub Cream from 1997 to 1999. He has also worked on the soundtracks of films such as Swordfish, The Matrix Reloaded, Collateral, and Die Another Day, for which he remixed the James Bond theme, as well as writing the theme music to Big Brother.