5 Facts / 5 tracks with Hatiras

Hatiras, hailing from Toronto, Canada, has been a staple in the House Music scene for over 3 decades. He started out as a rave promoter and then moved on to producing his unique style of spacey, loopy, upbeat, jacked-up disco House when he purchased a sampler in the late 90s. One of his first releases, titled “Spaced Invader” was a global hit released on Defected Records and supported by everyone from Pete Tong, Roger Sanchez, The Chemical Brothers and beyond. 

Since that time, he’s been non-stop dropping music and touring the world representing his cosmically funky sound. He runs his own imprint – Spacedisco Records. He’s released hundreds of singles, half a dozen albums and is constantly in the top House sales charts at Beatport and Traxsource. His latest single is called “Make It Happen” – it’s a playful classic House tune adorned with sweeping strings, bumping bass and a catchy vocal primed to raise the roof! It’s the second single on Mark Knight’s newly launched Fool’s Paradise Records. 

We caught up with Hatiras for a quick round of 5 Facts / 5 Tracks…

5 Facts:

1. Hatiras didn’t plan to be a globally respected musical artist. His deep love for rave-related music and culture saw him producing large scale rave events through the 90s during his late teens and opting to remain in the background. His close friends knew him as “MC Shadow”. He was a quiet, reserved rave promoter that would occasionally spit a drum & bass flow on the mic at his parties. He was also studying Pre-Med at University. It wasn’t until he released his first globally successful EP that Hatiras was reluctantly thrust into the limelight.  

2. Following his early global success as an artist at the turn of the millennium, Hatiras launched his own record label in 2003 called Blow Media. He took the label to almost 100 releases and then switched gears to start an Electro House label called Hatrax Records in 2009 (which he also took to almost 100 releases). In 2016 Hatiras launched his third record label – Spacedisco Records. This label just surpassed 400 releases and is currently home to over 100 artists. 

3. Although born in Toronto, Hatiras lived in Johannesburg, South Africa for a few years as a child. His family moved around quite a bit. In 2009 he moved to Portland, Oregon where he launched a weekly Monday night House Music party called Madhouse Mondays. Although currently back in Toronto, Canada, he’s lived in over a dozen homes and credits living in different cities, and situations and travelling the world to making him an open-minded, creative and flexible fellow.

4. Hatiras is a bit of a gear nerd that loves graphic design, photography and video editing as much as music-making. He splits his time between the above activities. His tools of choice are Ableton, Photoshop, Final Cut, his Sony A74 camera and lenses plus his racks of analog audio equipment. Not only does he master every single release on his label, but he also designs all of the artwork, and event flyers, shoots photos and also creates and edits animations and videos. He can often be seen at his shows in incognito mode, walking through the crowd with his camera, capturing the moment and gathering memories. 

5. Hatiras is a cat-lover and loves spending time with his girlfriend’s one-eyed, toothless little calico kitty “Shakira”. Shaki is happy, healthy, cuddly, and often seen resting on his lap while he brainstorms new track ideas. You could say she’s his purr-duction partner. 😉 

5 Tracks

1. Daft Punk – Burnin’

When this album dropped back in ’95 it blew my mind. The build up and bass line in Burnin’ is legendary and absolutely epic. The drums have so much swing and swag. Still my favourite album of all time. Timeless.  

2. Aly-us – Follow Me 

I was a teenager just exploring the underground rave and House scene in Toronto when I first heard this tune. I remember going to a dark basement party in Toronto around ’92 and actually hearing Aly-us performing “Follow Me” live! There had to be only 100 people or so at the party, all circled around the vocalist. Something I’ll never forget. Back when the music was truly underground and word of mouth drove the scene. 

3. Acen – Trip To The Moon (Part 3)

When this dropped in the early 90s it represented the birth of a whole new sound, style, culture, and way of making music. It was the birth of Rave! Twisted, pitched-up samples and breakbeats, combine chaos with melody. Glow sticks, fat shoelaces, all-night parties…

I was so deeply into this sound when it first dropped. It then evolved into breakbeat, rave, jungle, drum and bass, etc. Acen is one of the most underrated pioneers and geniuses of our scene. There’s no way to listen to this one without getting goosebumps… 

4. Joe Smooth – Promised Land

THE defining song of classic vocal House Music for me. The lyrics, drums, chords, bass line are pure bliss. A timeless message about unity, hope and PLUR <3 Listening to this takes me back to an era when I never left home without a cassette tape.

I was that pushy, purist kid who was like “turn off the damn commercial, brainwashing radio and put this tape in…” It was always House and rave-related music on my tapes…

5. Hatiras – Make It Happen

Digging through my old records, I found this sample by House legends Victor Simonelli and Lenny Fontana. I never knew the original and wasn’t sure if it got noticed when it first released in the 90s.

But, it was just too good of a hook to not be brought back to life with updated production, arrangement, drums, strings and a killer new bass line. With their blessing, Victor, Lenny and the big boss Mark Knight really got behind this one and pushed me to release it.

It’s been smashing the crowd in all my sets and it’s out now as the second single from the newly launched label – Fool’s Paradise! I’m honoured to be working with these legends and excited to be carrying the soulful House Music torch forward with this release. 

Hatiras ‘Make It Happen’ will be released on all download and streaming platforms on August 11th 2023 on Fool’s Paradise Records from https://Fools.lnk.to/MakeItHappen