Fort Romeau

South London producer and DJ Michael Greene, who records as Fort Romeau, steadily sharpens and broadens his signature approach to rich, euphoric house music. After the well-received 2012 debut Kingdoms appeared, 2015’s Insides incorporated ambient textures, Krautrock passages, and cosmic disco threads. Numerous singles and EPs issued on Running Back and Live at Robert Johnson have since anchored countless DJ sets. His third album, Beings of Light, arrived in 2022 and blended dreamy techno with rainy-day ambient atmospheres, while 2024’s Romantic Gestures, Vol. 1 centered on deep house and garage.

A dedicated record collector, Greene began hunting vinyl at fairs and jumble sales alongside his father at age eight. He pursued studies in music and visual art in Brighton before relocating to London upon completing university. In addition to contributing guitar alongside Ital Tek’s Al Myson and serving as keyboardist in La Roux’s touring band, Greene cultivated Fort Romeau’s gradual, euphoric aesthetic inside a bedroom studio equipped with an aging laptop and a Yamaha DX7. Kingdoms surfaced in 2012 on 100% Silk, a home to kindred spirits such as Coyote Clean Up. The album’s reception prompted an active 2013 that included the March single SW9 on Ghostly’s Spectral Sound label, followed by July’s Jetée/Desire single and September’s Stay/True EP on Ghostly itself. While preparing Fort Romeau’s second album, Greene delivered the 2014 Her Dream EP through Live at Robert Johnson.

Released by Ghostly in March 2015, Insides drew from Greene’s own DJ sets as well as disco and kosmische music. That same year he co-founded the Cin Cin label with Ali Tillett, which went on to present music by Nick Höppner and Todd Osborn. Fort Romeau also issued a series of concise releases that year, among them the Fairlights EP and Frankfurt Versions, a set of Insides remixes. The Secrets & Lies EP emerged on Live at Robert Johnson in 2016, joined by a Cin Cin collaboration with Bezier. The next year Running Back put out Emulators, an EP shaped by the E-MU II workstation, while the self-released Reasons EP also appeared. Self-issued “Pablo” preceded 2018’s SPC-140, marking a return to Spectral Sound. Additional 2019 EPs surfaced on Permanent Vacation (Heaven & Earth), Live at Robert Johnson (Dweller on the Threshold), and Correspondant (DADA), alongside Cin Cin tracks made with Simian Mobile Disco’s Jas Shaw.

Two further Permanent Vacation EPs, Fantasia and The Mirror, followed in 2020. Phantasy Sound released the rave-recalling “FWD NRG” in 2021 ahead of another Permanent Vacation single, “Control.” Fort Romeau rejoined Ghostly for the 2022 full-length Beings of Light, which took cues from the work of American artist Steven Arnold. He later teamed with Massimiliano Pagliara and Coloray for the single “Reset.” Several singles, among them the U.K. garage-leaning “Hold Up” and deep house cuts such as “The Man from Another Place,” appeared on the Romantic Gestures imprint and were compiled on the 2024 full-length Romantic Gestures, Vol. 1.