As the son of a DJ, Tiga has always been around electronic music, touring with his father around Goa, India, in the 80s. Beginning to DJ in Canada in the 90s, Tiga saw that there was little to offer in regards to the rave scene, deciding to take matters in his own hands and organized his own parties, taking credit as one of the first people to throw Canada’s first proper rave. Tiga took things further, starting the techno-oriented record store, DNA, as wells the Turbo label, along with DJ Mark Dillon.
It was not until the 2000s that Tiga began to produce his own music, releasing the successful mixtapes, “American Gigolo” and “Mixed Emotions.” He also found a hit with his collaboration with Jori Hulkkonen, on a reinterpretation of Corey Hart’s “Sunglasses at Night,” as the duo, Tiga & Zyntherius, reaching number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. Tiga continued with his remixes and relentless touring, helping to keep him at the top of his game. A successful contribution to the K7 series of mixes, DJ Kicks, came out in 2003, making a big contribution to the current trends in the scene.
In 2006, Tiga released his debut album, "Sexor," which went on to win at the 2007 Juno Awards for 'Dance Recording of the Year.' "Ciao!" followed in 2009, again released to critical and commercial success, from both the underground and mainstream press. Tiga's duo with German techno producer, Zombie Nation, ZZT, released their debut record, "Party's Over Earth" in 2011, helping to expand Tiga's output. A new mix, "Tiga Non-Stop" followed in 2012, premiering his new single, "Plush," to great fanfare. As well as his solo output, Tiga is also the host of the popular BBC 6 Music show, "My Name is Tiga," to which he plays the hottest tracks in electronic music.
Canadian DJ-producer Tiga (real name: Tiga James Sontag) has messed around with almost every subgenre of electronic dance music, but he’s perhaps best known for his work in electro. He’s been in the game a long time; long before electro, electro house, etc, had filtered into the mainstream. I held some of his early productions in the same high regard and some of the first Justice tracks, and his mix compilations in the early noughties were some of the best from that time, as were his remixes. Of course Tiga is an acclaimed and renowned performing DJ, but it’s always surprised me that he hasn’t had more mainstream recognition. Perhaps the semi-underground space that he inhabits suits him better. I first saw Tiga perform at XOYO in 2011. It was the first time I had ever been to the East End underground basement; this was before the refurb, so it was even dingier than it is now. This dark, gritty space was the perfect setting for his underground club music. Tiga’s set was more up-tempo and bass-y than usual; there was little in the way of vocal samples and points of it shunned melody all together in favour of harder techno beats. Of course, it was the funky electro cuts that got the best reception, but on this night Tiga proved that he was adept at toying with plenty of other genres. As a sidenote: upstairs in the completely empty bar area, Pariah and Blawan smashed out wicked sets, literally just before they blew up. Great night.