Pictureplane

Travis Egedy works under the Pictureplane name as an indie electronic producer who also produces visual art and designs clothing, with many observers crediting him for first using the phrase "witch house." His tracks pull strongly from nineties dance styles such as rave, hip-house, drum'n'bass, and trance, yet they carry a gritty, lo-fi distortion drawn from D.I.Y. punk and noise circles. Raw, sensual compositions by Pictureplane regularly examine occult symbolism, gender identities, and facets of hyperreality.

Egedy entered the world in Santa Fe, New Mexico in 1985. He launched the Pictureplane project while residing in Denver and taking classes at Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design. Starting in 2004 he issued his own albums of homemade noise-pop, sharpening both his recorded sound and stage presence at the D.I.Y. warehouse venue Rhinoceropolis, which he helped turn into a hub for Denver’s underground community. After Turquoise Trail appeared in 2007, dance music and club culture from multiple eras began to shape his work more decisively. Remixes of HEALTH’s “Die Slow” and Crystal Castles’ “Air War” circulated online and stirred widespread blog attention, as did his exuberant, wide-ranging DJ mixes that moved between happy hardcore, jungle, goth, and darkwave. He subsequently aligned with New York’s Lovepump United label and delivered the album Dark Rift in 2009. Around the same period, Pitchfork, Stereogum, and XLR8R featured Pictureplane; the promotional MP3 “Goth Star,” which sampled Fleetwood Mac, attracted notice through those outlets. Isomorph Records released the EP True Rain Light Body in 2010, containing a Teengirl Fantasy remix.

Pictureplane’s second Lovepump United full-length, Thee Physical, addressed the meaning of physical contact in a post-modern, digital age and arrived in 2011. Early the next year came Dimensional Rip 7, a remix album with contributions from Grimes, Tearist, Extreme Animals, and others. After Egedy relocated to Brooklyn in 2012 he toured with Crystal Castles and Major Lazer while continuing to release singles and online DJ mixes. He also began crafting beats for underground rappers such as Antwon and Noah23. Anticon signed Pictureplane in 2015 and issued the album Technomancer that October.