1997–2002: Champion scratch DJ A-Trak rapidly rose to prominence when he won the
DMC World DJ Championship in 1997 at the age of 15, making him the youngest and first Canadian winner of the competition. A-Trak, who had been involved in the Montreal turntable and hip hop scene for a year or so at this point, was hailed by the international community as a highly technical and accomplished turntablist during the height of the
scratch DJing in the 1990s. Between 1997 and 2000, he competed as a DJ internationally. A-Trak was the first DJ to win all three major DJ competition titles (
DMC,
ITF and
Vestax), as well as the first DJ to win five World Championships. While he retired from competition in 2000, he continued to showcase his turntable skills in important DJ forums. Also in 1997, A-Trak and his brother Dave, along with creative director Willo Perron, founded the Montreal-based record label Audio Research. Audio Research released a series of turntable and hip hop records and compilations, mostly as
12" records. The label was officially dissolved in 2011. In the late 1990s, A-Trak developed a notation system for scratching. He gave a lecture about it at the Skratchcon 2000 conference and published an article in
Tablist Magazine.
Obscure Disorder and DJ crews In 1995, A-Trak, with brother Dave 1 and hip hop artists Troy Dunnit, Eclipse, and Logik, formed the hip hop crew Obscure Disorder as an after-school project. The group was part of the
Montreal underground hip hop scene in that late 1990s and began releasing their music through Audio Research Records in 1997. The group released a series of singles until they split up in 2002. A-Trak was an honorary member of the pioneering, and now defunct, DJ crew
Invisibl Skratch Piklz. He was also a member of the DJ crew The Allies alongside frequent collaborator
DJ Craze, as well as
DVLP,
Infamous, Spictakular, and J-Smoke; they released an album
D-Day in 2000. The crew performed as a competitive turntable team from around 1998 until 2000.
2002–2007: Touring DJ After leaving the competitive DJ scene, A-Trak was interested in DJing for touring artists. A-Trak deejayed at clubs and festivals and released DJ mixes. In the spring of 2006, A-Trak embarked on his first headline tour, titled the Sunglasses Is A Must Tour. It was also around this time that A-Trak began more seriously producing music. They first met earlier that year when A-Trak was playing a show at a tiny record shop in London where
Kanye West came to support
John Legend who was also playing in the same show. For the following three years, A-Trak worked closely with West, including at performances alongside the rapper at MTV specials, the
Grammy Awards, multiple
MTV Video Music Awards, and worldwide stadium shows; this included West's
first two headlining tours which ran almost continuously from March 2004 until April 2006. A-Trak also recorded scratches on West's second and third studio albums
Late Registration (2005) and
Graduation (2007) and was an influence on the overall sound of the latter. A-Trak's most notable Kanye West credit is for the scratches on the 2005 single "
Gold Digger." Near the end of 2007, A-Trak split with Kanye West to pursue the founding of his record label.
Original music and remixes In 2007, A-Trak released popular remixes of
Architecture in Helsinki's "Heart It Races,"
Scanners' "Bombs," and
Digitalism's "Idealistic," among others. He sometimes releases his bootlegs and remixes under his alias Trizzy. He also released the original singles "Say Whoa" on the French label
Kitsuné. In 2008, A-Trak collaborated with Nike to create the 'soundtrack'
Running Man: Nike+ Original Run; as part of his collaboration with Nike he also released the singles "Mastered (Me & My Sneakers)" featuring
Lupe Fiasco and "Running Man." That year, he also collaborated with
Laidback Luke for the first time, releasing the single "Shake It Down" and co-produced the track" Like The Dancefloor" featuring Natalie Storm with DJ Zinc. One of A-Trak's prominent remixes, a mix of
Boys Noize's "Oh!," was also released in 2008. In 2009, A-Trak released his full-length album DJ mix
Infinity + 1. The follow-up record as a solo artists was 2012's
Tuna Melt EP, released by
Fool's Gold. The video for "Tuna Melt" was nominated in the Best Cinematography category at the
MTV Video Music Awards. Notable releases by A-Trak between these two records include: "Ray Ban Vision" featuring
CyHi Da Prince (2010), "
Warrior" with
Mark Foster and
Kimbra for
Converse's
3 Artists, 1 Song project (2012), "Money Makin'" with
Dillon Francis (2012), and remixes of
Daft Punk's "
Robot Rock" (2009),
Sébastien Tellier's "Kilometer" (2009),
Justice's "
D.A.N.C.E." (2010),
The Rapture's "How Deep Is Your Love" (2011), and
Surkin's "Never Let Go" (2012). On June 8, 2010, A-Trak released his remix of the
Yeah Yeah Yeahs' track "Heads Will Roll", which was also featured on the
Project X soundtrack. In 2013, collaborated with
GTA,
Laidback Luke, and
Oliver, and released popular remixes of
Phoenix's "Trying to Be Cool" and
Odd Look by
Kavinsky. In February 2013, A-Trak released the video for his "Piss Test" remix off of the
Fool's Gold album. The video features appearances by
Jim Jones,
Juicy J,
A$AP Ferg,
El-P, Flatbush Zombies, and
Flosstradamus and was directed by
Shomi Patwary. In 2008, A-Trak played a series of high-profile music festivals including
Coachella and
Glastonbury. He had sets at
Primavera Sound,
Lollapalooza, and
Parklife in Australia the following year. He also headlined his 10,000LB Hamburger Tour and a series of Bacardi B-Live sets. In February 2010, it was announced that A-Trak would perform live shows with
Travis Barker, who had previously worked with their mutual friend, the late
DJ AM. That year, he also played many
EDM music festivals including
Ultra,
Electric Daisy Carnival, and
Electric Zoo. The following decade, A-Trak continually at prominent music festivals and clubs. In 2011, he embarked on another headline tour, The Magic 8 Ball Tour and played again at Coachella. In 2012, he deejayed at Ultra and Electric Zoo and at similar festivals the following two year.
Fool's Gold founding After moving to
Williamsburg, he founded the label
Fool's Gold Records with Nick Catchdubs and artist Dust La Rock in 2007. A-Trak and Catchdubs, both DJs, curated a multi-genre roster and have been integral in supporting the rise of many prominent hip hop and electronic artists. In 2011, A-Trak launched Fool's Gold Radio on the SiriusXM station Electric Area. The show continued for a few years. Also, in 2011, A-Trak opened a shop named Fool's Gold in Williamsburg. The shop closed in early 2017 and reopened on May 20 of the same year at a larger location nearby.
Duck Sauce In 2009, A-Trak collaborated with
Armand Van Helden to form a disco house production duo under the name
Duck Sauce. They released the song "
Anyway" in October on
Ministry of Sound. Duck Sauce has achieved success worldwide including reaching the top chart position in twelve countries and attaining the number one spot on the US Dance
Billboard charts for their song "
Barbra Streisand". "Big Bad Wolf" was released by Duck Sauce in 2011 on BBC Radio and samples wolves howling. Following the announcement of a debut album, Duck Sauce released the singles "It's You" and "Radio Stereo". They released their first album, 'Quack', in 2014. Duck Sauce has been on the cover of
DJ Mag twice, most recently in March 2020. In 2020, they also returned with two new singles, the first since 2014, "Smiley Face" and "Captain Duck".
2014–present: New collaborations and ventures Since the EDM explosion brought A-Trak to the forefront of electronic music in the 2010s, he has continued to evolve and innovate as both a producer and music executive, securing his position "of elder statesman of the culture." The company is the largest record promotion pool in the U.S. and serves the open-format DJ community with curated music from worldwide labels. He is also an investor and minority partner in Montreal-based imprint SAINTWOODS, which operates venues, a marketing agency and a clothing line.
New collaborations Coming off a series of releases with Duck Sauce, A-Trak continued to collaborate with other artists, especially artists on Fool's Gold. In January 2014, A-Trak teamed up with
Cadillac in a campaign to introduce their new logo and the 2015 ATS Coup. On November 25, 2014, A-Trak released his
Push EP, featuring his single "Push", (featuring Andrew Wyatt). The song was included in
FIFA 15 and received a companion remix album featuring remixes from
The Chainsmokers,
Cazzette,
René LaVice,
DallasK, among others, in 2015. A-Trak received much publicity and released a string of singles in 2015. These included his remix of
Alesso's song "Cool" and his single "We All Fall Down" (featuring
Jamie Lidell), as well as remixes by Volt & State, CID and Jarreau Vandal. A-Trak was featured on
Zhu's 2015 EP
Genesis Series for his track "As Crazy as It Is" and was also featured on
Disclosure's
Magnets [The Remixes] EP, for his remix of "Magnets" (featuring
Lorde). At the end of the year, A-Trak's "Place on Earth" single with ZooFunktion was released on
Spinnin' Records. A-Trak was featured on the 2016
Fool's Gold Records compilation album ''Fool's Gold Presents: Night Shift,'' for his song "Only One" with
Ookay. On May 3, 2016, A-Trak premiered his single "Parallel Lines" (featuring
Phantogram) on
Zane Lowe's
Beats 1 Radio show. A-Trak embarked on an Australian Tour with fellow producer
What So Not on June 30, 2016. With
Kanye West and
Lex Luger, he also co-produced the song "
Champions". In 2017, A-Trak released "Believe" featuring
Quavo and
Lil Yachty, collaborated with
Baauer for two singles, "Fern Gully" and "Dumbo Drop," and produced the song "Kitana" for
Princess Nokia. He was also featured on tracks by
Calvin Harris and
The Cool Kids. In 2018, the single "
Ride for Me" was released as a collaboration by A-Trak, Falcons,
Young Thug and 24hrs via A-Trak's record label Fool's Gold. In 2019, A-Trak released two singles, the disco-house track "Work It Out" in April and the Loods collaboration "What Can I Do" later that year, as well as a handful of VIP reworks on his recent A-Trak Bootleg Series, an informal collection of free releases he's made for his DJ sets. It was rumored that the producer was to release larger collection of music later in 2019 or in 2020. In 2020, he began formally collaborating with his brother
Dave 1 under the moniker The Brothers Macklovitch. They released two original singles that year, "Give Love to Get Some" and "I Can Call You."
Expansion of Fool's Gold A-Trak's label began growing and his duties for it with it. Additionally, he began his own weekly two-hour radio show on
Beats 1, listened to via
Apple Music Connect, named
Day Off Radio on July 4, 2015.
Goldie Awards A-Trak helped to found a new DJ award in 2017 called the Goldie Awards. His hope is to create a new forum for DJ battles and contemporary scratch DJing. The annual awards competition takes place in New York every year and A-Trak is an integral part of the affair. == Sound and equipment ==