Ryan Hemsworth

Blurring the lines between hip-hop, R&B, and indie pop, Canadian DJ and producer Ryan Hemsworth has worked with the likes of Lana Del Rey, Shady Blaze, Quadron, and Tinashe while maintaining a similarly collaborative solo career. Debuting with 2010′s Cover Yr Shame EP and Distorted, a collaboration with Shady Blaze, he issued his full-length solo debut, Guilt Trips, in 2013. Additional dance-pop efforts Alone for the First Time and Elsewhere were buffered by joint EPs with the likes of Lucas and Yurufuwa Gang.
Raised in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Hemsworth was attending the city’s University of King’s College when, while sitting in class, he saw one of his bedroom productions posted on a music publication website. Ecstatic and encouraged, the producer sent his tracks to Shady Blaze of the Bay Area’s Main Attrakionz crew, and the two began a professional relationship. Hemsworth became Attrakionz’s constant engineer and occasional producer, which opened up doors for work with Deniro Farrar, Sole, and others, while Quadron and Lana Del Rey hired him for remix work.
After the release of Distorted (2011), a full-length collaboration with Shady Blaze, Hemsworth’s solo career took off with the release of his Last Words EP (2012) on the WeDidIt label. The full-length debut Guilt Trips (2013), issued by Last Gang, featured Baths, Tinashe, and Sinead Harnett among the guest artists. Its dreamlike hybrid sound was acknowledged with the 2014 Juno Award for Electronic Album of the Year. The brief Alone for the First Time (2014) and another co-billed release, Taking Flight (with Seattle-based producer Lucas, 2015), followed during the next couple years. “Burying the Sun,” “Wait,” and “Commas” were among the slew of singles that led to Elsewhere (2018). The supporting cast on Hemsworth’s third album included rappers E-40, 21 Savage, and G. Perico. He closed the decade with Circus Circus, a 2019 collaboration with Yurufuwa Gang.
In 2020, Hemsworth released the Pout EP and Quarter-Life Crisis, which was issued under an alias of the same name. ~ David Jeffries & Andy Kellman