Hey, Good Looking, wha'cha got cookin'

The distance between Atlanta's growing drum 'n' bass scene and the other side of the Atlantic, birthplace of the form, got a little shorter thanks to Good Looking Records' North American booking agent, Jennifer Walker.

Walker, 27, arrived in Atlanta after graduating from college in 1995, convinced of the city's potential for growth following the Olympics. After months of chatting with Chicago House producer Felix da Housecat in an AOL chat room, Felix offered to play Walker's birthday, and three days later was booked at Club SOL. Felix was so impressed with Walker's turnaround that he suggested she get into party promotion.

"I laughed it off with, 'I don't want to mix business with pleasure, I'm here for the music,'" says Walker. But soon music and business became pleasure: Pleazure Productions.

Pleazure would produce several highly successful parties, featuring DJs such as Paul Oakenfold and Aphrodite, but it was a 1997 LTJ Bukem date, his first Atlanta appearance and Pleazure's first international artist, that Walker considers her first success.

Bukem, whose most recent releases include an album of original material, Journey Inwards, the fourth volume in the house-ier Earth series, as well as the fifth Progression Sessions, most reminiscent of his live sets, helped create a strain of drum 'n' bass that embraced ambient and jazz. Bukem's award-winning label, Good Looking Records, also organizes the UK downtempo event/sub-label, Cookin'.

"The question," poses Walker, "is not why do I want to work with them, rather, why wouldn't I?"

So, because of her connections to LTJ and several North American cities, Walker agreed to route the Progression Sessions V tour from her Atlanta apartment. "There is a sense of accomplishment conquering the world in your pajamas!" admits Walker.

LTJ Bukem featuring MC Conrad, Nookie, Dean Coleman and Little Jen play the Masquerade Sept. 22. For more information or to order tickets visit www.pleazure.net.