ATTLAS

Canadian EDM producer Attlas creates lush, intricately designed productions combining elements of ambient, IDM, house, techno, breakbeat, and trance.
Born Jeff Hartford in Toronto and immersed in music from a young age, he was classically trained in piano and trumpet, and also learned to play guitar, bass, and banjo. He spent his childhood playing in bands, learning about recording and production; his first paying gig was playing trumpet in a jazz club. During college he continued to hone his songwriting skills, and, after graduating, interned with film score composer Trevor Morris. He composed classical-inspired jingles for commercials before finding his calling in electronic music during trips to Amsterdam and Berlin. He started teaching himself how to produce, taking his stage name from that of a villain in the video game Bioshock, and in 2014, sent his demos to Deadmau5′s label Mau5trap, which signed him. Deadmau5 took Hartford under his wing as a protégé, teaching him more about studio production. Attlas broke out in 2015 with his remix of Deadmau5′s “Aural Psynapse”; the label then released his first single, “Scarlett,” and a trilogy of EPs, “Siren,” “Scene,” and “Sin,” which gained a lot of buzz. For a while, fans believed that Attlas was in fact a new alias of Deadmau5 himself, until Hartford’s identity was “outed” by DJ Pete Tong. Over the next few years, Attlas released several more EPs, and also made a name for himself as a sought-after remixer with a string of high-profile reworks for the likes of Rihanna, Tove Lo, I Hate Models, and Pendulum. In early 2020 he released his debut album Lavender God. ~ John D. Buchanan