Dan Sperber

The guitarist, singer, composer and radio personality, born in 1972 in Bavaria, Germany, first found success with jazz futurists The New Loungehead in his home town of Auckland, New Zealand, where he has mostly lived since 1980.

In 1997 The New Loungehead won that year‘s Jazz Award at the New Zealand Music Awards for their debut album, Came A Weird Way’, which featured many of Sperber’s compositions and his distinctive, languid guitar style.

More success followed with The Relaxomatic Project, a collaboration with drummer Luke Casey, which reflected Auckland’s High St jazz and DJ culture at the turn of the Millennium. The group brought Sperber’s guitar playing to the fore and also benefitted from the production skills and bass playing of Justyn Pilbrow, who would later form <a href="spotify:artist:5kDPuvM5kIV3tqpsppoUfB" data-name="Elemeno P">Elemeno P</a> and produce <a href="spotify:track:2QjOHCTQ1Jl3zawyYOpxh6" data-name="Sweater Weather">Sweater Weather</a> by <a href="spotify:artist:77SW9BnxLY8rJ0RciFqkHh" data-name="The Neighbourhood">The Neighbourhood</a>. Relaxomatic grabbed international attention via compilations like Lazy Sunday and The New Sounds Of Jazz, on the Blue Note Label.

In 2003 Dan relocated temporarily to Berlin and recorded an album of his compositions with <a href="spotify:artist:1Yg6bZ6S9YzNlDSeB0ou2G" data-name="Hayden Chisholm">Hayden Chisholm</a> and <a href="spotify:artist:3xPlPWSAHpPLg4UQAtm09d" data-name="Samuel Rohrer">Samuel Rohrer</a> under the name <a href="spotify:artist:10ItFmFTtu1ZJh9vjVAgZN" data-name="Dan Sperber Complex">Dan Sperber Complex</a>. This album was self-released in New Zealand to critical acclaim.

At this point Dan turned his focus to family life and a teaching career. It was not until 2015 that he recorded again, as <a href="spotify:artist:1YZR4839dDtu2uYXIny6tC" data-name="Spammerz">Spammerz</a> with <a href="spotify:artist:4CKMBCukZabJI2D8ptpSx3" data-name="Alan Brown">Alan Brown</a>, creating the album <a href="spotify:album:1glqY810Gf1EaXQoTcFhoi" data-name="Tear Yourself Together">Tear Yourself Together</a>.

In 2018 Dan, as <a href="spotify:artist:2INVoa0myO6u9rNESw6MfP" data-name="S P E R B 3 R">S P E R B 3 R</a>, recorded <a href="spotify:album:2cGNwKXAM4CfqjMWLZfIBi" data-name="Think on Your Feet">Think on Your Feet</a>, his vocal debut.