page_title: Endtroducing.....
section_title: Background
hierarchical_section_title: Endtroducing..... / Background
caption_attribution_description: English: Launch party for MoWax Japan at club Blue in Tokyo, August 6, 1997. Original article archived at Vh1.com! www.vh1.com/artists/news/899/19970813/dj_shadow.jhtml
context_page_description: Endtroducing..... is the debut album by American music producer DJ Shadow, released on September 16, 1996 by Mo' Wax. It is composed almost entirely of samples, mostly from vinyl records, and features moody, slow tracks and upbeat jams reminiscent of Shadow's early hip hop influences. Shadow produced Endtroducing over two years using minimal equipment, primarily an MPC60 sampler.
  In the United Kingdom, where DJ Shadow had already established himself as a rising act, Endtroducing received critical acclaim and peaked in the top twenty of the UK Albums Chart. It was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. Mo' Wax issued four singles, including the chart hits "Midnight in a Perfect World" and "Stem".
  It took considerably longer for Endtroducing to find success in the United States. After promoting the album and returning to his hometown of Davis, California, Shadow devoted his time to creating new music. During this period, interest in Endtroducing began to build among the American music press, and it peaked at 37 on the US Billboard Heatseekers Albums chart.
context_section_description: DJ Shadow began his music career in 1989 as a disc jockey for the University of California, Davis campus radio station KDVS. As a high school student, he had experimented with a four-track recorder to create music from samples, inspired by sample-based music such as It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back (1988) by American hip hop group Public Enemy. His KDVS work impressed A&R representative Dave "Funken" Klein, who signed him to the Hollywood BASIC label to produce music and remixes. DJ Shadow's output during this period – including the 17-minute-long "Entropy" and his work with the Solesides crew – brought him to the attention of British musician James Lavelle, who signed DJ Shadow to his Mo' Wax label.
  DJ Shadow's singles for Mo' Wax – including "In/Flux" and "Lost and Found (S.F.L.)" – were, as Sean Cooper of AllMusic wrote, hailed as "genre-bending works of art that merged elements of funk, rock, hip hop, ambient, jazz, soul, and used-bin found records." Mixmag journalist Andy Pemberton coined the term "trip hop" in June 1994 to describe "In/Flux" and similar tracks played in London clubs at the time. DJ Shadow's follow-up single "What Does Your Soul Look Like" topped the British independent music charts. Following this period, he began work on his debut album, intent on capturing the downbeat mood that characterized his first singles. He chose the title Endtroducing as "it signified the fourth and final chapter in a series of pieces that I was doing for Mo' Wax with a certain sound, a certain tone, a certain atmosphere."
caption: DJ Shadow (left) with Mo' Wax label head James Lavelle
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