| Born in London, England, and with his early childhood in Kingston, Jamaica, John began his music career in Toronto, Canada in the 1970's, writing and performing in local groups, until joining Canadian band Bond. Later stints with the show-band Canada, Kid Rainbow (Gary O), Beyond, and FUNN, added to his experience of performing live as a multi-instrumentalist musician, singer, and songwriter. John was discovered by producer Terry Brown, of Rush and Klaatu fame, which led to a long partnership with Klaatu's Dee Long, who built ESP Studios in Buttonville, and then Studio 5, at Sir George Martin's AIR Studios in London, England. Canadian projects included, Klaatu, Images in Vogue, Dalbello, and Glass Tiger, and in London, Mark Knopfler, Paul McCartney, Demis Roussos, Sir George Martin, and the AKAI S1000. In 1987, John (JJ) began working with Duran Duran, going full time for the Liberty album in 1989, which led to great success in 1993 with the Wedding Album, and its hit's, Ordinary World and Come Undone. JJ also performed with DD in concert, and on their MTV Unplugged performance. His last Duran Duran production was 1995's Thank You. Productions in Toronto, New York, Cap D'antibes, London, Reykjavik, Concord, and Los Angeles, with artists, Rick Nowels, Alan Frew, Dan Hill, Fleetwood Mac, and Celine Dion, who John received a Grammy Award for being one of the producers of the Album of the Year in 1997, Celine's; Falling into You, which also won Pop Album of the Year, and Jones was also awarded for Engineer, Album of the Year, and Engineer, Pop Album of the Year. At the end of the 20th century, Jones produced the first million-downloaded-song on MP3.com, for artist Emily Richards. The pair would work together on multiple Emily Richards albums between 1999 and 2009. In 2003 Jones built Drumroll studio in Burbank with Tom Petty's Steve Ferrone, and recorded and produced sessions for Jeff Young, Steve Ferrone's Farm Fur, Jeff Golub, Alex Ligertwood, Brian Auger, Keb Mo, Steve Postell, Cassandra Denver, Dean and Robert DeLeo, Mike Campbell, Zuhdi and Frank, Susie Chin, Emily Richards, Sabian, Neil Peart, The Dares, and others. Jones produced Julian Lennon's, Children of the World, with Nick Wood, for the Taylor Foundation, working for children's cancer in Japan. After the Tohoku and Fukushima disaster, John worked again with Nick Wood on producing Hope for the Beyond Tomorrow Foundation, with Julian Lennon, Tetsuya Komuro, and the Boys and Girls Club of Boston, to aid orphans of the disaster. By the end of the nought's, and further into the 21st century, John began production for the Music is Hope Foundation, in support of Sao Paulo's Meninos Do Morumbi, a music school, and social program, for children from the Paraisopolis favela. The album, Meninos Do Morumbi and Friends, was released at the end of 2015 and featured Julian Lennon, Alex Ligertwood, Emily Richards, Terry McDermott, Richie Kotzen, Barnett O'Hara, Fred Mandell, Michael Thompson, Steve Ferrone, Gene Anderson, Gary Twinn, Alan Frew, Gary O and Meninos Do Morumbi. John Jones has released two solo albums of his own songs; One Moment in Time (1998), and Black N White (2009), as well as three volumes of song recordings (2016), with more releases expected. |
