Danzel - Topic

Danzel, born november 9th 1976 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.

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, recordlabel N.E.W.S. proposed them to make a remake of a song by “The Black & White Brothers”

Called “Pump it up”. . . and yes . . . 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” ...