Laurent Garnier

A passion for classic Detroit techno and Chicago acid house drives French DJ/producer Laurent Garnier’s long career. Garnier was born in Boulogne-Billancourt in 1966 and began DJing for his family at age 10 after becoming obsessed with Black American music. He moved to Manchester in 1986, and his house-heavy weekly party at the city’s legendary Haçienda club incited the likes of The Stone Roses and Happy Mondays to funk up their rock. Garnier returned to France in 1990 and released his debut EP, Stronger by Design, in 1992. He hit the UK charts with his 1994 debut LP, Shot In the Dark, and sealed his appeal with singles like “Crispy Bacon” and “Flashback”. While the jazzy “The Man With the Red Face” was a highlight of 2000’s Unreasonable Behaviour, Garnier took a darker turn on 2005’s The Cloud Making Machine, an ambitious meditation on Paris’ homeless population. After spilling his full palette of dance-floor moods onto 2009’s Tales of a Kleptomaniac, Garnier concentrated on producing artists for his own label, scoring films and writing music for contemporary choreographers.