Pim Koopman: The Master Producer
Pim Koopman was born on the 11th of March 1953. He started his career as a professional musician in the High Tide Formation, who developped into Kayak in 1972. With their "pomp-rock" they had a number of hits in the Netherlands. Pim played on their first 4 albums and quit in October 1976 to become a fulltime producer. His first year as a producer he was a staff producer at EMI, working with acts like the Flyin' Spiderz (whose manager Leo Lintermans would become Diesel's first manager), Radar and with Rob Vunderink as Concrete. Out of the Concrete-project Diesel was developped as a full-blown act. He was not just the drummer of the band, he also wrote songs and masterfully produced the records. Although Pim is not a real singer his voice was used to great effect, e.g. the Cockney-accent in "Alibi" : "Sorry dahlin', li'l delay, can't be 'ome t'noit, although ah troid" . Originally Pim considered Diesel a studio project, but as the band became succesful he toured with the band for about two years. He left Diesel early 1981 just before their American tour. As a producer he had a whole string of hits for acts like Maywood (late 70's and early 80's), Valensia, Flavium and Marco Borsato (in his Italian period). In 1983 he released an album with recording engineer Okkie Huijsdens as lead-singer, ex-Diesel bass-player Frank Papendrecht and ex-Diesel guitarist Bas Krumperman under the name of The President. Some songs on the CD sounded real Diesel-like apart from the dominance of synthesizers, whereas Diesel was primarily a guitar band. This was followed by a second album "Muscles" in 1985, again with Okkie and Bas. Pim then joined the revamped Diesel in 1988 along with ex-members Rob Vunderink and André Versluijs. This line-up made two singles and laid the Diesel legacy to rest before the decade was out. Pim just continued doing what he had been doing since he left Kayak: write songs and produce records for the likes of Robby Valentine, Yoni de Boer and his big friend Irishman Michael Robinson. His latest babies are Flair with singer Heather as the star. Pim contributed a lot of songs to the Diesel repertoire, like "Going back to China" and "Samantha". And watch out for an unreleased Koopman gem "Settle for the moon"!
