Kate Simko

Kate Simko crafts beats that feel insistent, hypnotic, and sensual while remaining strikingly pristine, blending Detroit techno and Chicago house into a distinctive trajectory all their own. In the work of this classically trained pianist, minimalism meets majesty, generating compositions that have built her a loyal audience across the electronic music community. Chicago-born Simko dove into the local underground dance circuit during her teenage years, landing regular airplay on college station WNUR and rising to dance music director by the late-'90s even as she pursued music theory studies at Northwestern University. During a 2001 trip to Santiago, Chile, she encountered fellow techno trailblazer Andres Bucci, leading the pair to establish Detalles together. Throughout the '00s her sound kept developing, and in the second half of the decade she settled in at Ghostly Records, a happy haven for electronica inventors. The 2009 full-length Music from the Atom Smashers, created as the soundtrack for the physics documentary of the same name, drew favorable notice well outside underground circles.