Vita

About

Vita an alias of Mikael Stavöstrand, 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 Reduce on Force Inc., swarms of glitches, crackles and skips infiltrate the 4/4 drive formula of minimal techno. As Vita, his Vita E.P. on Force Lab, was to meet critical praise and became 1 of the best-selling releases with its digitalised organic groove.

He started to produce music in the early 1990s, but back then he was a part of the industrial scene and released a bunch of classic records under different names, lately due to a lot of demand from different labels, he agreed to allow reissues of these early works.

After that period, he got more interested into sound research and minimalism, that also led to a couple of CD releases on labels such as Staalplaat in The Netherlands, to name a few. In 2000 he became more focused on bringing his experiences and sound from the pure minimal scene, into a more club context, so he started to work with minimal techno sounds, that led to result immediately with releases on Force Inc. in Germany.

The last years he has been playing live around the globe, for example Mutek in Canada and in Mexico, Japan, and all over Europe. At the moment he is also working on different collaborations, as the Luus project together with Johan Fotmeijer, deep minimal techno with a melodic touch, Stavöstrand & Skugge, and the Bulgur Brothers, together with Johan Skugge and Andreas Tilliander.

His output has been a bit quiet for a while, but that does not mean that he has been on the lazy side. In 2005 he released 1 album and 4 EPs with different projects, and 2006 will see a whole bunch of releases, solo, with Bulgur Brothers, with Johan Skugge and Andreas Tilliander, Stavöstrand featuring Erika with singer Erika out of Stockholm, a new project together with [a]pendics.shuffle from Los Angeles, and other more. So 2006, looks already like a very bust year, working with labels such as Karat out of France, Adjuct in Los Angeles, Audiobahn in Malmö. Contexterrior in Berlin, Mineral, Sunset Diskos, Mitek and much 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 is exciting between abstract minimalism and experimental tech house. Mitek has been around since September 2000, and has as so far produced 14 albums, 5 EPs and 2 t-shirts. 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. With artists such as himself, [a]pendics.shuffle, Agaric and Bulgur Brothers.

Recently he licensed tracks for the Fabric mix series, as well as a new mix CD by James Holden. And his music is heavily played by DJs such as Matthew Dear, Jeff Milligan and Jay Haze to name a few! Mikael has played live at some of finest clubs in the world such as: Panorama Bar, Fabric, Rex Club, Watergate, Fuse, Avalon and many more.

Direct links

• Discogs https://www.discogs.com/artist/21594-Vita
• Facebook https://www.facebook.com/mikaelstavoestrand
• Resident Advisor https://de.ra.co/dj/mikaelstavostrand
• SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/mikael_stavostrand

What is Vita doing in 2023 and beyond?

[No information and not set.]