It’s been a good few years for Maya Jane Coles. Voted ‘Producer of the Year 2011′ by DJ Mag, named ‘Best Breakthrough DJ 2011′ by Mixmag, debuting at No. 9 on the Resident Advisor ’2011 DJ Poll’, scooping ‘Best Newcomer 2011′ at the Ibiza DJ Awards 2011, many magazine covers and the likes of Anja Schneider, Ellen Allien, Damon Alburn and Tricky all queuing up to offer their praise. She landed Best Deep House Garage House Track at WMC 2012, two BBC Radio 1 Essential Mixes, and her very own DJ Kicks collection, and at the end of 2012 was named by Rolling Stone as the 15th most influential DJ in the world.
An eclectic daughter of similarly eclectic parents, Maya was surrounded by a mixture of sounds from Dub to Punk to Soul to Jazz to World to Classical music around the house. Having learned to play a few instruments and fiddling with songwriting, production felt like the natural next step.
Her production started with Hip Hop, and moved into Drum & Bass, and after a musical epiphany she started her love affair with House, which has become where she is best known, although she still satisfies her love of bass producing dubstep under the Nocturnal Sunshine alias.
Her first real breakthrough came with “What They Say” on Real Tone. Supported by a list of dance floor dignitaries including Laurent Garnier, Tony Humphries, Ekkohaus, Steve Bug and DJ Gregory, it obliterated both the sales charts and critics hearts on Beatport, and maintained a three month run in the top three of Resident Advisor’s charts at the end of 2010.
A bit obsessed with quality control, on a typical Maya Jane Coles record, Maya will have written, produced, engineered, arranged, mixed and performed every element of the track, occasionally lending vocals and album art as well.
With releases on labels like Dogmatik and Loco Reocrds Supreme, Real Tone and Hypercolour, Virgin Records, Island Records and a host of others, she’s graduated to playing gigs at BBC Electric Prom, Sonar Festival, and Bestival, among others, and an enviable run touring internationally.
Her debut full length album “Comfort” was released in July 2013 to critical praise and commercial success.
In between gigs and solo producing, she is one half of the dub-electronics outfit She Is Danger with vocalist Lena Cullen. The two have played fetish club Torture Garden, opened for The Orb, and have heard their tracks play everywhere from BBC’s Radio 1, to KCRW and Per Se.
She is Danger received has recieved critical and fan attention for their remixes of artists from Gorillaz to Groove Armada, as well as an acclaimed with an acclaimed, dubby reworking of Massive Attack’s ‘Girl, I Love You’ included on the band’s ‘Heliogland:Deluxe’ album.