With both weekends of Coachella 2016 in the rearview mirror, there are now twice as many contenders for best set of the festival. For our money, ZHU‘s week 1 performance still easily ranks among the top five, due in no small part to inventive edits and reworks like his remix of Faithless’ 1995 trance classic “Insomnia.”
As with much of ZHU’s work, the “Insomnia” remix he dropped during his week 1 performance synthesizes elements of house music and bass music without fitting neatly into any single category. The instantly recognizable synth lead of the original is punctuated with 808 drum rolls that don’t sound anywhere near as forced as you might imagine, and as can be seen in the above video, the whole of the arrangement was well received by festival goers.
ZHU‘s made proven a force to be reckoned with since the launch of his project two years ago, and after kicking off his Neon City tour with such finesse, 2016 looks to be another fruitful year for the L.A.-based DJ/producer.