Eggermont, Jaap (31 October 1946

Composer, drummer, engineer and producer from Den Haag, The Netherlands, who drummed for The Pirates before jumping ship and joining The Golden Earrings in 1964. He stayed with them for five years and appeared on the albums: Eight Miles High; Just Earrings; Miracle Mirror; On the Double; and, Winter Harvest. One of their earliest hits on which he appeared was “Please Go”, which cracked the top ten in The Netherlands.

In 1969, he was replaced and decided to pursue a career as a producer. One of his first efforts was Wang Dang Doodle, which he produced for the band, Livin’ Blues. He also worked with a band named Swingin’ Soul Machine, who curtailed their name to Machine in time for a self-titled album in 1970. In 1972, he reuinited with Livin’ Blues for their album, Bamboozle, and teamed up with Jack Cornell on “Everyday’s Torture”, a top-ten hit in Belgium and Holland. Earth and Fire recruited him for Atlantis, which was released in 1973. In December of that year, another group with whom he was working, Smyle, laid down their inaugural release, “Hit the Big Time”, although the song, and group, did not. They broke up in 1974. It was no skin off Jaap’s nose, as he was having some success with groups such as Catapult and Greenfield and Cook. He also stayed busy with Earth and Fire, releasing To the World of the Future in 1975. In 1976, he produced Patricia Paay’s “Livin’ Without You”, which went to #7 in The Netherlands. He also co-wrote “Zero to Zero” for The Monotones and produced their sort-of-self-titled “Mono” which went to #9 in Switzerland.

In 1981, he would offer up what would become his magnum opus, a mostly Beatles medley under the moniker of Stars On or Starsound, depending on where you lived. They were known as Starsound in Europe and Stars On in the States. The group was basically Jaap and a bunch of session musicians and singers he had hand-picked to imitate The Archies, The Beatles, and Shocking Blue, all on top of an unrelenting disco beat. The song was enormously popular, rising to #1 in The Netherlands and the United States, and #2 in the United Kingdom. In 1981 and 1982, Jaap and his collaborator, Martin Dusier, received The Netherlands’ Conamus Export Prize to acknowledge their accomplishments in enhancing the country’s economic and cultural climes.

It was such a massive success, it helped Jaap collect enough cash to purchase Blaricum’s Soundpush Studios, where he continued to roll out more Starsound/Stars On recordings, as well as produce for The Star Sisters, who had performed background vocals on Stars on LP. In 1983, they unleashed Stars on 45 Proudly Presents The Star Sisters. It was followed by Hooray for Hollywood in 1984, the same year that saw Nits’ Adieu, Sweet Bahnhofreleased, with Jaap at the engineering helm. In 1985, he produced Vandenburg’s third LP, Alibi. His swan song with Stars On was 1987’s Stars on Frankie, the title tune of which went to #16 on the Dutch chart. Around 2004, he produced Fridolijn van Poll’s first solo CD. In recent years, he has focused more on arranging music for commercials for big-name clients such as Heineken.

Stars On 45 recordings
Medley: Intro “Venus” – Sugar Sugar – No Reply – I’ll Be Back – Drive My Car – Do You Want to Know a Secret – We Can Work it Out – I Should Have Known Better – Nowhere Man – You’re Going to Lose That Girl – Stars on 45 (Jeff Barry/Martin Duiser/Jaap Eggermont/Andy Kim/Robert Van Leeuwen/John Lennon/Paul McCartney)

Stars on 45 (Martin Duiser/Jaap Eggermont)

https://youtu.be/7xgr4xRlasc

Sources:

Eggermont, Jaap (31 October 1946 – Present)

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