Danzel (BE)
Danzel, born November 9th1976 as johan waem, took his first steps in the music industry at the age of 15 By founding the Belgian pop-rock band “Scherp op snee” as vocalist. As a self-taught multi-instumentalist, he soon became the bass player of the band as well. Apart from that, he was the backing-vocalist in “The la band”, which accompanied big artists in Belgium. As a multi-instrumentalist and entertainer he also started to write and compose his own music.His professional career started in 2003 by competing in the Belgian version of “idols” where he Made it to the final 20 contestants. Right after “idols”, he came in contact with Jaco van Rijswijk, a producer who had some big hits in the 90’s. Jaco introduced him into dance music, since danzel had always been making rock music. Late 2003, record label n.E.W.S. proposed them to make a remake of a song by “the black & white brothers” Called “pump it up” and that’s how it all began.
People who haven’t been living on mars for the past 20 years know that “pump it up” became a smash hit and was signed to all major labels in the world, resulting in over 4 million copies sold worldwide. It charted top 10 in practically every country on the planet, resulting in numerous gold/platinum records. His vocals on the track were used for thousands of remixes of the track, they were even used by “the black eyed peas” in 2009, endor in 2019 and Dimitri Vegas, like Mike & Steve Aoki in 2022. After “pump it up”, big international hits were: “Put your hands up in the air”, “You spin me round”, “My arms keep missing you”, “What is life”, “Under arrest” and so on.
Danzel has collaborated with DJ F.R.A.N.K., Regi, Laurent Wery, Rebel, Airwave, Mirami, Kabe and so on. He has done an enormous amount of shows all over the globe for audiences sometimes exceeding 200.000 people! He got an Eska Award in Poland, an MTV-music award in Russia, several gold/platinum records for the sales of singles/albums, over 100.000.000 views on YouTube, over 60.000.000 streams on Spotify. Since Poland is one the biggest markets for Danzel, he is also touring with a full band show there since 2009, lifting his entertainment value even higher. He is by viewers called as “one bolt of energy”. In 2022 he was asked by polish tv “Polsat” to compete in the popular tv-show: “Your face sounds familiar” as the first international artist ever, and after performing as Seal, Tina Turner, Joe Cocker, Lenny Kravitz and so on. Danzel is still working together with different artists/producers and is constantly touring the world with his biggest hits, in “Live on tape” format or with full band.