Ray Slijngaard

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Ray Slijngaard is a Dutch rapper and singer, born in 1971, who is best known as one half of the Eurodance duo 2 Unlimited. That project was set up in 1991 by the Belgian producers Jean-Paul De Coster and Phil Wilde. Slijngaard was asked to write a rap for one of their songs. He also came up with a chorus for a female singer and brought in Anita Doth for it. The demo went down well, and so the group around Ray and Anita came into being.

Music and breakthrough

The first single was Get Ready for This, which was picked up in Europe and beyond, including at sporting events. After that came, among others, Maximum Overdrive, No Limit, Tribal Dance, The Real Thing, Twilight Zone and Workaholic. Slijngaard rapped on most of the tracks, in a deep, rhythmic voice over fast dance rhythms and hard synthesizers. He also stood out for his hairstyle, with a shaved head and a few dreadlocks on the forehead.

Influence

In 1996, after four albums, the group stopped. Slijngaard started a record company of his own and worked on new projects, and in 2009 he was on stage again together with Anita Doth. His role shows how the face of a dance act can also be a writer and co-originator, while the music itself came into being in the producers' studio.

Listening

In School of Rock

The chapters, maps and magazine stories of School of Rock are currently available in Dutch only.

• Mixtape 13: From Cassette to Cloud^NL Reader

Mentioned in other articles

• No Limit SongThe face of the group was Dutch: the rapper Ray Slijngaard and the singer Anita Doth.