Matias Aguayo

Matias Aguayo is a left-field dance music producer, vocalist, and DJ who injected doses of playfulness and seduction into the techno scene. Initially associated with minimal techno, his later work was anything but, incorporating bizarre vocal arrangements, pop instincts, sensuality, and a sharp sense of humor. First receiving attention as part of the duo Closer Musik during the early 2000s, he went solo with 2005's beguiling Are You Really Lost. In 2009, he released the innovative, vocal loop-heavy Ay Ay Ay and founded the Cómeme label. The eclectic, ambitious album The Visitor appeared in 2013, and Sofarnopolis, the debut from his post-punk-influenced band the Desdemonas, was released in 2017. On 2019's all-instrumental Support Alien Invasion, he fused Latin rhythms with industrial minimal techno. A moody, experimental collaboration with Julianna, Que Si El Mundo, arrived in 2022.

Aguayo was born in Santiago de Chile but moved to Cologne, Germany at the dawn of the '90s. By the end of the decade, he'd collaborated with Kompakt co-founder Michael Mayer under the name Zimt before forming vocal-based tech-house duo Closer Musik with Dirk Leyers. They released two singles and one well-received album (2002's After Love) before splitting. Like his ex-partner, Aguayo remained closely associated with Cologne's Kompakt label and remixed tracks by Leandro Fresco and Mayer. He joined Mayer on a reinterpretation of Kylie Minogue's "Slow" just before making his proper solo debut with 2005's Are You Really Lost, an album featuring co-productions with Markus Rossknecht (Aguayo's partner in the duo Broke).

Aguayo continued releasing solo 12" singles on Soul Jazz, Kompakt, and his own Latin American-centric Cómeme, with 2008's "Minimal," a scathing jibe at the minimal techno scene, receiving a fair amount of attention. His second solo album for Kompakt, 2009's Ay Ay Ay, was predominantly composed of looped vocals, and included the catchy singles "Rollerskate" and "Menta Latte." Aguayo's third solo album, The Visitor, just as strange and alluring as his first two, was released by Cómeme in 2013. One more Kompakt EP, Legende, appeared in 2014, but four volumes of El Rudo del House EPs were issued by Cómeme in 2015. Dirty Dancing, an EP with Spoko, appeared on the label in early 2017.

Aguayo formed a post-punk-influenced band called Matias Aguayo & the Desdemonas, and their debut full-length, Sofarnopolis, was released by Crammed Discs in October of 2017. Support Alien Invasion, a return to abstract techno and one of Aguayo's darkest releases, appeared in 2019. The EP Que Si El Mundo, his first collaboration with Colombian DJ and musician Julianna, was released in early 2022. Aguayo then released a single containing an updated, extended mix of his 2013 album track "El Camarón," backed by a Ricardo Villalobos remix. ~ Andy Kellman & Paul Simpson, Rovi