Bruno Pronsato

In another lifetime, Bruno Pronsato (Seattle producer Steven Ford) drummed for Texas speed-metal/punks Voice Of Reason. But then he had his head split open by My Bloody Valentine, Gang Of Four, Electric Company, death-metal titans like Venom, Slayer, and Napalm Death. “My childhood was filled with music, but [Slayer’s] Haunting the Chapel and Hell Awaits just somehow transported me to some weirder level,” Ford recounts. “It somehow made it okay to just be as free as possible with music. And from the time I was 14 or 15, it was a steady process of finding out and getting deeper and deeper into people who were, in my opinion, really shaping the future of music.”

After Voice Of Reason split, there followed a period of musical disenchantment, during which Ford moved to Seattle in 1998. There he commenced making computer-based music. Incorporating the above influences along with inspiration from European atonalists like Anton Webern and Arnold Schoenberg, Ford gravitated toward microsound, taking the name Bobby Karate to chop out intricately designed glitchscapes that unpredictably fizz and crackle like the best output from the Raster-Noton and Mille Plateaux labels.

While establishing his rep as Seattle’s foremost sculptor of powerful, electronic abstractions, Ford dabbled with dance music production under the Bruno Pronsato moniker. What began as a lubricious lark to get the ladies bumpin’ and grindin’ became Ford’s primary obsession. Two years followed in which Bruno conducted live dancefloor experiments with the support of the fertile community around Seattle’s Robotrash night. This work resulted in his groundbreaking full-length on Orac, Silver Cities. Since this amazing debut, Bruno has become one of the most critically acclaimed producers and performers on the minimal techno scene, consistently pushing boundaries with his music yet remaining undeniably danceable.