Nepol Records
Groove Element is the Jacksonville, Florida remix duo of Chris Havens and Marc Smith — old friends whose musical bond predates electronic music entirely: Smith, a blues guitarist from Willingboro, New Jersey (set on his path the day B.B. King pulled him on stage and handed him his guitar pick), once led a blues quartet with Havens behind the drum kit. Havens, born in Nashville and raised on Miles Davis and Coltrane, studied drum-set and jazz at the University of North Florida — a rhythmic pedigree that earned his production comparisons to Danny Tenaglia and DJ Garth. Alongside Jason Short they formed Bio Genesis, whose “Thoughts of the Future” launched Nepol as NR 001 in 2001; as Groove Element, they took Sattva’s “Lightsound” and rebuilt it into the stripped-down, minimal B-side of NR 003 — Havens’ chunky tribal funk and Smith’s layered harmonies distilled into relentless kicks aimed squarely at the dancefloor.
The partnership with Jason Short ran deep and long. Marc Smith went on to form Coalition of the Killing with Short in the mid-2000s — the duo named a Beatport Minimal Artist to Watch in 2009, with records supported by DJs from Laurent Garnier on down — and became a co-founder of San Francisco’s Auralism Records in 2007, running the label’s marketing while it helped move the city from a house town toward a techno town.
Today Smith records as Indoor Man — a name he says brings his many experiences together as one — releasing on DJ Three’s revered Florida-born Hallucienda label, with cosmic, jacking house-and-techno EPs, a slot on XLR8R’s Hallucienda showcase, and a full-circle remix of Sol Glissant’s “Song of Solitude” in 2022. He has also recorded as KAMM and Safeword. Twenty-five years on, the Jacksonville thread that started with Groove Element still runs through American underground dance music.