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Artist News
Dave Lee drops Joey Negro alias
By Andy Malt | Published on Wednesday 22 July 2020
Producer and DJ Dave Lee has announced that he is dropping his Joey Negro alias, 30 years after he first used it. In a Facebook post he says that he has tried to stop using the name several times before, but has always gone back to it because it’s more widely recognised than his birth name. However, he adds, now is the time to ditch the moniker for good.
In his statement, he explains how the alias came into being in the first place, when he quickly needed a name for a track release and, to meet the deadline, he simply looked through a pile of records and mashed together the names of Pal Joey and J Walter Negro.
“Back then I never ever imagined the name as a longterm thing that I’d ever DJ under or be addressed as face to face”, he goes on. “It was just for the label of a record”.
When it was suggested that a subsequent EP sounded like a follow-up to that initial Joey Negro release, he used the name again, and when a track from that EP blew up the alias stuck.
“I then began doing lots of remixes and even when I put Dave Lee on the mix name credits, the record label would change it to Joey Negro”, he says. “And, in fairness to them, this was the name the general public was familiar with”.
“In truth, I’ve not felt comfortable with the name Joey Negro for a while, especially as I’ve got older”, he continues. “I’ve stopped using it a few times but establishing a new name as an artist isn’t easy and I’ve ended up going back to it”.
“I understand now, though, that it’s not appropriate for me to carry on using the name. I’ve recently received emails, tweets etc saying that it is unacceptable and people find it out of place in 2020 – and I agree”, he goes on. “From now on I’m dropping Joey Negro as a pseudonym, and all those future releases that weren’t already in production will carry the name Dave Lee”.
“I’m sorry to have caused any offence”, he concludes. “My whole life has been about music but particularly black music, I love soul, funk, disco, jazz in a way that’s impossible for me to articulate in words and I have tried to champion it with the best intentions”.
A number of bands and artists have dropped what are seen as racially insensitive names in recent weeks, of course, in the wake of the most recent round of Black Lives Matter protests, including the acts previously known as The Dixie Chicks, Lady Antebellum, The Black Madonna and Slaves (the US band, not the UK duo).
