J-Zone

Drummer and NY native Jay "J-Zone" Mumford's childhood dream of playing bass guitar in a funk band died when Jheri curls fell out of fashion at the end of the 1980s. Those funk aspirations would eventually resurface behind a drum set almost three decades later, but with music being what it was in 1991, it just wasn’t happening. Like many a Gen Xer growing up in New York, he gravitated to hip-hop in the late '80s, via his funk bass study guide tunes appearing as samples in EPMD, Kwame and Jungle Brothers songs.
After a series of studio internships and engineering gigs in the early '90s, Jay developed as a hip-hop producer/artist and went on a decade-long run as J-Zone, producing for the likes of Biz Markie and others. But by 2008 he'd become frustrated with the music business (the rap game in particular), began to dislike his own music and walked away from everything. In 2011, he wrote and published a memoir to close the chapter and soon after, discovered a passion for drumming when his father gifted him a cheap Sonor drum set (at a tender 34-years old). Over the next five years, Jay made the final leap from hip-hop-jack-of-way-too-many-trades back to his instrumentalist roots. Though self-conscious about his atypical path to drumming at first, Jay soon discovered playing grooves from the perspective of a producer/DJ wasn’t a hindrance, but a unique approach that helped him in building both live and session experience.
A full-time session and touring drummer since 2018, Jay done sessions with Danger Mouse (for Black Thought, Karen O and Broken Bells), Dan Auerbach of The Black Keys (for Los Hermanos Gutierrez), Just Blaze, Lord Finesse, Binky Griptite (The Dap-Kings), Prince Paul/De La Soul, DJ Nu-Mark, Soul Supreme and many more, as well as holding the groove in his band, The Du-Rites, Black Pumas guitarist Adrian Quesada's Boleros Psicodelicos band and in the legendary Manzel (of "Midnight Theme" fame). Jay's drum breaks have been sampled by producers and artists like Mark Ronson, Madlib, Alchemist, Marco Polo and others. His interview series (“Give the Drummer Some” through Red Bull Music Academy/Red Bull Radio) saw Jay having in-depth discussions with legendary drummers like Questlove, Mike Clark, David Garibaldi, Steve Ferrone, “Funky” George Brown of Kool and the Gang and Bernard Purdie as part of his education.