Manni Dee

Manni Dee produces searing experimental techno laced with industrial textures and also pursues work in film and fashion. Early EPs shaped by dubstep and glitch-hop marked his entry in the first half of the 2010s, after which he shifted emphasis toward abstract techno with the 2012 release Shifting. His debut album The Residue appeared via Tresor in 2018, while A Low Level Love followed on Perc Trax, a label with which he has maintained close ties, in 2021. He founded the London imprint and club series Silk + Steel in 2022 and placed the EP Boundless with Fabric in 2024.

Born in Wolverhampton, England, Manveer Dheensa, who records as Manni Dee, pursued music from an early age, completing a music course at Dudley College and later relocating to Brighton for university studies in Creative Music Production. His debut came with the 2010 digital-only EP Fluxus, whose sound referenced glitchy trip-hop. The 2011 EPs Antidote and Superposition continued in a comparable vein, incorporating bass and electronics reminiscent of Planet Mu. Although his formative tastes leaned toward indie and dance music, Dee increasingly gravitated to the techno aesthetic pioneered by fellow Midlands artists Regis and Surgeon. The 2012 release Shifting introduced clunking rhythms that fused techno’s dense atmospheres with dubstep swing, signaling a decisive evolution. By late 2013 he had issued four further singles, among them the Pareidola EP and Between Deeds and Desires on Black Sun, the label home to Blawan, AnD, and Sunil Sharpe; during the same period he established himself as a regular DJ across U.K. and European club nights.

In 2014 Dee moved further into industrial techno with Dreams, Fears & Idols and Amid the Collapsing Scenery, alongside the collaborative Habits of Hate EP recorded with Leeds producer Happa. The next year he delivered Human Image, the first release on Amsterdam’s Leyla imprint, followed by Behaviour Cycles for Sunil Sharpe’s Earwiggle, while also devoting attention to his ambient alias Nuances. Leyla subsequently issued the Counterculture EP, whose track titles offered direct commentary on British politics, including “Cameron on the Guillotine” and “We Live in Hope.” In 2017 Perc Trax released his first EP for the label, Throbs of Discontent, whose severe techno aligned with the imprint’s hard-edged industrial aesthetic; before year’s end he returned to Leyla with the abrasive Your Public Image.

The 2018 album The Residue marked Dee’s first full-length for Berlin’s Tresor. He contributed to Daniel Avery’s Song for Alpha and supplied remixes for Avery, the Horrors, Louisahhh, and Sleaford Mods. Additional EPs appeared, among them 2020’s Everyone’s Replaceable Now, ahead of Perc Trax issuing his second album A Low Level Love in 2021. He inaugurated Silk + Steel with the 2022 EP The World Goes On Without You; later releases on the label explored pop-inflected club material alongside Akiko Haruna and Di-Vincent. Fabric issued Dee’s Boundless EP in 2024.