Mikael Stavöstrand

Mikael Stavöstrand is a Swedish minimal and electronic artist. Mikael was born in Stockholm, Sweden 1972, and is now based in Los Angeles, CA. He has been featured as a key figure of the Swedish electronic music scene for his unique interpretations of minimal club techno as well as for producing some of the most essential experimental electronic music of the past years. Stavöstrand mixes deconstructed sounds with funky little beats to create minimal dance textures. On his debut album on Force Inc., "Reduce", swarms of glitches, crackles and skips infiltrate the 4/4 drive formula of minimal techno. As Vita, his "Vita" 12," released on Force Inc. imprint Force Labs, met critical praise and became a best selling release with its digitalized organic groove. He started to produce music in the early nineties, but back then he was a part of the industrial scene and released a bunch of "classic" records under different names. Recently, due to high demand from different labels, he agreed to allow reissues of these early works. After that period he became more interested in sound research and minimalism, which also led to a couple of CD releases on labels such as Staalplaat in The Netherlands. In 2000 he became more focused on bringing his experiences and sound from the pure minimal scene into a club context, so he started to work with minimal techno sounds, which immediately led to releases on Force Inc. in Germany. In recent years he has been playing live around the globe, for example, at Mutek in Canada and in Mexico, Japan, and all over Europe at respected clubs such as Panorama Bar, Watergate, Otto Zuts, Cargo, Brancaleone etc. At the moment he is also working on different collaborations, such as the Luus project together with Johan Fotmeijer, deep minimal techno with a melodic touch, Skugge&Stavstrand, and the Bulgur Brothers together with Johan Skugge and Andreas Tilliander. His output has been a bit quiet for a while but that doesn't mean that he has been on the lazy side. In 2005 he released one album and 4 ep's with different projects and 2006 will see a whole bunch of releases, solo, with Bulgur Brothers with Johan Skugge and Andreas Tilliander, Stavostrano feat. Erika with singer Erika out of Stockholm, a new project together with (a)pendics shuffle from LA and other constellations. So 2006 looks already like a very busy year. Working with labels such as Karat, Adjuct, Audiobahn, Mo's Ferry, Rrygular, Contexterrior, Mineral, Sunset Diskos, Sushitech, Audiobahn, Spectral and more. Since 2000 he also runs the Mitek label. The aim and policy for the label is to produce, release and promote new Scandinavian artists within the field of experimental electronic music. For us this includes everything that's exciting between abstract minimalism and experimental techhouse. Mitek has so far produced 14 albums, 5 eps and two t-shirts.. In the years Mitek has not only been a label releasing music, but also organized shows and showcases of Swedish electronic music around Europe and Japan.. We see Mitek more as a platform than a pure label. In the summer of 2006, we will also see the birth of his new label "Sunset Diskos", this label is purely for club music, deep and funky minimal tunes is the aim here. With artists such as himself, [a]pendics shuffle, agaric & Bulgur Brothers. Now he also got signed by Kindish/Get Physical with two of his other projects, Vita and The Skull, with a bunch of releases coming up in 2007. Recently he licensed tracks for Audions Fabric mix CD, a new mix Cd by James Holden, Circo Loco @ DC10 CD in Mixmag March issue and Fuse presents Steve Bug mix CD plus upcoming mix CD's by Agoria, Steve Bug and MANDY. His music is heavily played by Dj's such as Matthew Dear, MANDY, Ricardo Villalobos, DJ T, Ryan Elliot, Tanya Vulcano, Marco Carola, Dinky, Butane, Jeff Milligan, Troy Pierce, Magda and Jay Haze to name a few. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.