Proprietor of the Cynosure label, Mike Shannon is not only one of the most impressive DJs you've ever seen on the ones-and-twos (and sometimes threes); for over a decade he has served as one of Canadian electronic music's key figures. Now based in Valencia, Spain-having moved on from his hometown of Toronto, and later his chosen home for many years of Montreal-Shannon increasingly figures as one of global techno's pacesetters as well; just witness his label's recent releases from Latino/Euro-tronic stalwarts like Pier and Andres Bucci and Sieg Über Die Sonne, alongside Canadians Adam Marshall, Mossa, Sunaj Assassins (Shannon and Jay Hunsberger) and of course Shannon (aka John Shananigans) himself.

Shannon was a core member of Canada's minimalist explosion of the late '90s, with solo records and remixes for labels like Force Inc., Logistic, Dumb-Unit, and Musique Risquee; but more recently his work has evolved to fuse minimal techno's finely honed rhythmic instincts with classic downbeat's broader tonal palette. His new CD for ~scape, Possible Conclusions to Stories that Never End, fuses click-based percussion with rich vocal harmonies and diverse instrumentation-a complex and song-based combination that yielded unprecedented results when he performed for the first time in a laptop-plus-live-band setting at MUTEK.

www.cynosure-recordings.com
www.scape-music.de