Nik Weston


Nik Weston is a DJ, music producer, record label owner of Mukatsuku Records and music buyer for Juno Records. Based out of London, UK, he was from the late 1990s to 2007 a key player in the promotion and distribution of Japanese recording artists and their releases outside of the country, as part of the late 1990s into 2000s revival in the jazz dance, soul-jazz and electronic Japanese music scene. He is a keen advocate of the vinyl record format.

Career

Nik Weston first entered the London dance music scene in 1994, when he started the club night Phony. He and two other friends then started a club night in Soho called Mukatsuku in 1997. It ran for 2 years from 1997 - 1999 upstairs at two floor room Club in London China Town called The Clinic, and was nominated by London Evening Standard Newspaper as 'club night of the year'.
He started the label Mukatsuku Records in 2006 after DJing as part of the Mukatsuku Crew since 1997. Weston started up a promotional company called Mukatsuku PR in 2001, doing consulting and promotion for labels such as Verve Records, Impulse, Sonar Kollektiv, Schema Records, and Ricky Tick amongst others.
As a DJ, he's played over 30 countries and supported Gilles Peterson, Jazzanova, and others. Since 2001 Weston has put out over 100 releases on various labels in the US, Europe and Japan, and 52 releases on his own Mukatsuku Records.

Discography

Production credits

DJ mixes

The following releases Weston compiled and/or did the DJ mix as a presenter, sometimes also handling A&R.
Mukatsuku Records is a record label started by Nik Weston in 2006, based out of London, UK. The label's general style of music is soul/funk/jazz/disco related and defined as dance music and/or black music of various origins. Many of the early releases were part of the jazz dance scene. Often, though not always, the music has a focus on Japanese recording artists. Mukatsuku Records releases all of its music on vinyl and releases neither albums nor digital content.

History

British DJ Nik Weston and two other friends started a club night in Soho, London called Mukatsuku in 1997. It ran for 2 years from 1997–1999 in an upstairs two floor room club in London China Town called "The Clinic", and were nominated by London Evening Standard Newspaper as 'club night of the year'. According to Weston, the name Mukatsuku translates in Japanese 'to feel sick, irritated or offended', and was picked as a subtle jibe at an acquaintance's use of the word as a catchphrase.
While A&Ring for Exceptional Records, Weston realized it was difficult to sign artists for single releases, so he endeavoured to start a vinyl-only, singles-only label. The label has since put out English, Japanese, Scandinavian and even New Zealand tracks. According to JellyJazz, "The Mukatsuku label is one of the best selling independent vinyls labels in the UK, and it is ONLY vinyls."
The label often releases music on social media such as their SoundCloud account, which as of June 2014 had over 15,000 followers.

Catalogue