What a career, with Ed Sheeran, Bruno Mars, Roberta Flack, The Roots and many others on his list of credits and collaborations.
Jake’s father and grandfather were both drummers and at the age of four Jakob was jamming guitar and singing with his Dad around New York’s blues boltholes. His godfather, the late Howie Blauvelt, played bass and sang with Ram Jam (whose track Black Betty was a huge hit) and also with Billy Joel early in his career with the Hassles.
He says he got used to being around microphones, and to the recording process in general, at an unusually early age, through making recordings with his Grandfather:
“He had a Panasonic cassette recorder which he used to record all his shows. I have a lot of cassettes in the studio now with me at ages 3 - 8 years old, singing, playing guitar and drums, doing skits, and pretending to be a weather forecaster. My Grandfather recorded everything.”
Jake intends digitising the cassettes and using clips of his former self on his forthcoming solo project, Good News, a blues-infused album due for release in 2019.
“I finally found time for some of my own music and I thought ‘I’ve been doing this all my life so why not include the past?’”