Spiller

Cristiano Spiller came from Venice and worked as a DJ before reaching an international audience. An early project with Tommy Vee under the Laguna name produced Spiller from Rio. The recordings placed him within a club culture where a strong instrumental figure could establish a record long before a wider audience knew the producer's face or name.

The track that became Groovejet developed in 1999, using material from Carol Williams' Love Is You and circulating through DJ sets before the vocal version arrived in 2000. Ellis-Bextor's performance gave the loop a new emotional situation, while the original instrumental movement continued to do substantial work underneath it. The resulting single reached number one in Britain without needing to turn into a conventional band recording.

Spiller followed with material including the electro-funk Cry Baby, released internationally in the early 2000s with remixes by Röyksopp and others. Sola explored another disco-oriented setting, with Nina Miranda contributing vocals. These records make the catalogue more varied than the repeated public life of Groovejet sometimes suggests.

Later Defected releases and new mixes returned the best-known recording to digital circulation and different generations of DJs. Spiller's own account of its creation emphasises a chain of musical and practical decisions, not a perfectly planned pop event. That history fits the sound: a record assembled for the pleasure of a groove, then opened into a song without losing the physical ease that made the instrumental work.