The Hamburg-based musician, real name Marco Niemerski, got his start a few years ago with a handful of EPs for Mirau Musik, the label he cofounded with Stephan Lorenz and Maik Pallasch. His records as Arp Aubert, a duo with Lorenz, were dusky, minimalist house vaguely in the vein of Hamburg’s Dial Records label. But his solo productions as Tensnake suggested a slightly different sensibility, drawing from ‘90s house classics as well as ‘80s electronic disco, warm and chilly all at once.

By 2008 he was developing his style on records for labels like Endless Flight, Mule Musiq, and Permanent Vacation. He had a runaway underground hit in 2009 with ”In the End (I Want You to Cry),” for Gerd Jansson’s Running Back label, and then in January 2010 he snapped everyone to attention with “Coma Cat,” a brilliant slice of vocal R&B with shades of both freestyle and Metro Area. Within months, Defected had snagged the single, and suddenly it was everywhere, helping pave the way into mainstream club play for likeminded slow-motion adepts like Soul Clap and the Wolf + Lamb crew.