James Hyman | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1970-04-18)18 April 1970 (age 54) |
| Origin | United Kingdom |
| Occupation(s) | Founder ofHyman Archive,DJ,music supervisor |
| Years active | 1988–present |
| Website | www |
James Hyman (born 1970) is a British radio and television presenter, music supervisor, DJ and the owner and founder ofHYMAG.
Hyman studied Film & Media at London Guildhall University (1989-1992, BA Hons, 1st), whilst working atMTV Europe despite his parents' misgivings (partly because of his father's glimpse of the music industry through his cousinBrian Epstein).[1]
For over 30 years, Hyman has been collectingmagazines,pamphlets,newsletters,brochurees,ephemera and other printed material. The theme of Hyman's collecting is "popular culture in print". Originally, he began collecting to assist his research atMTV Europe, where he was a script writer and programme producer. This was in a period where, according to Hyman, "magazines were the internet".
HYMAG contains over 5,000 individual title publications and over 150,000 individual issues as of January 2020.[2]
On 1 August 2012,Guinness World Records verified that, "The largest collection of magazines consists of 50,953 magazines and belongs to James Hyman (UK), in London, UK".[3] At that time, the collection featured 2,312 unique publications amongst the 50,953 magazines. The process of counting the magazines took approximately 128 days as James and Tory Turk worked their way through 450 crates filled with magazines.
As of October 2020,HYMAG's focus was to ensure preservation of the physical archive and digitisation of the entire collection via acrowdfunding page.
Hyman worked atMTV Europe from 1988 to 2000, as a press officer then as a programmer, producer and director. HisMTV shows, includingParty Zone featured in-depth interviews with the likes ofThe Prodigy,Goldie,Moby,David Holmes,The Chemical Brothers,Underworld,Paul Oakenfold, andAphex Twin.
Hyman also co-presentedMTV'sUp For It and fronted a spin-off fromMTV'sBytesize programme, providing daily reports on internet news andweb sites.[4]
In 1992, withColdcut, he produced a TV megamix[5] forCanal+ weekly pop-culture show, pre-empting his MTV megamix format and shows that began broadcast onMTV Europe in 1998.[6][7]
Presented onAtlantic 252 andXfm London as producer / presenter ofThe Rinse and co-presenter / producer ofThe Remix, the latter nominated for 2003SonyRadio Academy Award.[8]
The Rinse focused ondance music with Hyman also championing other emerging music trends such asbastard pop.The Remix focused onmash-up remixes and, according toThe Guardian, "led the craze" which caused some controversy when acease and desist order was issued for playing "A Stroke of Genius" byThe Freelance Hellraiser.[9]
TheXfm shows paved the way for the release of a number ofalbums:
September 2007, Hyman left Xfm to concentrate on hismusic supervision company JLH and other broadcast projects.[11]
A one-hour documentary aboutPaul Anka and his song "My Way" was produced by Hyman and Nick Minter as part ofBBC Radio 2's seriesSong Stories, first broadcast 23 February 2011. It was presented byMichael Buble and featured interviews withDavid Bowie,Donald Trump,Julien Temple andSteve Wynn onBBC Radio 2.[12]
Hyman expanded hisQuentin Tarantino mix tape,Pulp Mixin', to create a feature-length mash-up film, with the provisional titleJames Hyman/Quentin Tarantino Movie Mash-Up. It blends Tarantino's film footage with music videos, including those of the music used in the films.[13][14]
