Aliases in dance music can be a great tool. If fans expect a certain sound from an artist and said artist wants to explore new genres and sounds without alienating his or her fanbase, launching an alias circumvents potential problems. Artists like Eric Prydz, Green Velvet and others have proven this time and time again, but can it work for a universally recognized artist like deadmau5? We’re about to find out.
Movement Electronic Music Festival, the long-running Detroit techno festival, announced with its phase two lineup reveal that testpilot, deadmau5’s techno alias, would be headlining on Sunday, May 28. Once an unknown name with a release on Richie Hawtin and John Acquaviva‘s Plus 8 record label, testpilot was revealed to be deadmau5’s alter ego way back in 2014. Despite playing techno-heavy sets under his primary moniker, deadmau5 has only officially played as testpilot once before in a b2b with Richie Hawtin at SXSW in 2013. We expect the Movement crowd to be much more receptive of deadmau5’s techno leanings than crowds at some other events, and we hope to see him release more music and play more shows as testpilot in the future.
Check out the full Movement lineup below:
