Biography
Ken Jordan and Scott Kirkland, who formed the prolific electronica music duo The Crystal Method, drew on a bedrock of American funk, hip-hop, and soul for their Grammy-nominated music, including the Top 40 albums Tweekend (2001) and Legion of Boom (2004). Though the Crystal Method began in Los Angeles, the duo initially took root in Las Vegas, where Ken Jordan was a club DJ and program director for the University of Nevada Las Vegas' radio station. He struck a creative partnership with Scott Kirkland, and the two headed west to Glendale, California, where they began creating music in a home studio. A demo tape drew the attention of British DJ Justin King, who signed the pair to his record label, City of Angels. Their second single for the imprint, "Keep Hope Alive," became an anthem for the Los Angeles club scene, and led to high-profile DJ gigs and a record deal from Geffen's affiliate label, Outpost Records, in 1996. The Crystal Method's full-length debut album, Vegas, was issued a year later; the record reached No. 92 on the Billboard 200 thanks to a quintet of energetic singles, including "Trip Like I Do" and "Busy Child," the latter of which was also featured on numerous soundtracks. Its follow-up, Tweekend, reached No. 32 on the album chart, and featured a slew of high-profile guests, including Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello and Scott Weiland of Stone Temple Pilots; the Crystal Method continued to blur the boundaries between rock and electronic music with their third album, Community Service, which was an extension of a radio program they hosted on Los Angeles' popular Indie 103.1 station. The record, a continuous mix built on remixes of tracks by Garbage and P.O.D., among others, soared to the Top 5 on the Electronic Albums chart and No. 15 on the Independent Albums chart. The next decade found the Crystal Method tackling a variety of projects, from studio albums like the Grammy-nominated Legion of Boom, the theme for the Fox series "Bones" (2005-2017), an original soundtrack for the 2006 film "London," and the Nike-sponsored Drive (2006), a mix designed specifically for runners. They also built their own recording studio, Crystalwerks, where they recorded the Top 40 album Divided By Night (2009). Their next studio effort, simply titled The Crystal Method (2014), was briefly halted while Kirkland recovered from surgery to remove a benign cyst from his brain; the duo soon returned to their busy schedule of soundtrack work ("Lucy," 2014) and tracks for video games ("League of Legends," "Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell").
