The New LoFi

Is Tech House on the rise? — Four new artists that are pushing the genre

Who doesn’t love a sub genre? With tech house, it’s hard not to be attracted to how it brings together deep or minimal techno music with the soulful and jazzy end of house music. Sometimes minimal, sometimes not, with a tendency to include dub elements here and there. It’s one of my favorite sub genres of electronic music.

While tech house first came together around the mid to late 90s, I’ve noticed that there are a lot of emerging artists and a glut of new tracks being added to the catalogue in recent months. Here are four producers to keep an eye on.

Aaron Bonnema (better known by his moniker, AYYBO) is Californian-born party music hustler. Over the last year, Bonnema has risen to popularity as an artist with an arsenal of heavy-hitting house beats. His style is a mixture of dark, catchy grooves with a splash of funk. Since the second grade, Bonnema has gravitated towards music production, cinematography, and design. This has allowed him to fully channel and execute his creative vision for the project with every release. Check out his latest single, “Certified,” below.

Indeed, the Australian producer, Needs No Sleep, has been in the game for a while now, but he’s only really come onto my radar in big way last year when we featured him on the January 2023 Mixtape. He’s first emerged on the Australian club circuit to inject a deeper sound into the scene. Now he’s capturing dance floors all over the globe.

This month he’s teamed up with KXNE to release his new single, “Tempo.” Just wait until that beat drops just after the 30s mark; then you’re cruising.

I’ll admin that I know very little about the US-based producer, Jake Back, but I do like what I’m hearing coming out of his studio. Admittetly, he has more of a Detroit techno lean to his sound, but I’d still say he’s one to watch in pushing this genre up.

For his latest release, “lemme tell you,” Jake says he was trying to put his “modern techno/daft punk/house thing” on it. Have a listen:

Last up on the list is the new remix of “Pure Joy” — a collaboration between geriFree, Stacey Hale (aka Hotwaxx), and Walter Howard (aka HazMat Live).

geriFree started her music career in the Give a Beat program, where she made a name for herself with her infectious spirit and energy. And despite being new on the scene, she’s in her 60s — she knows first-hand what it means to evolve and transform throughout life and aims to inspire people and show what is possible when you keep working on yourself.

Stacey “Hotwaxx” Hale on the other hand has been in this game for a long while. She’s mostly known as the Godmother of House. So quite a vote of confidence to see Hotwaxx team up with geriFree for her single “Pure Joy.” I’d keep an eye on what Geri has in store for us next.

Cover Photo by Ben Wicks

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