Tobias Von Hofsten

Tobias von Hofsten was born in the south of Sweden in 1978 and started his musical career in 1994. Buying and collecting old drum machines and synthesizers he soon got into producing and dj-ing. After moving to Copenhagen, Denmark in 1997 he started his first label called Dark Disko. The first release was very well received and played and charted by artists such as Jay Denham, Mark Broom, Cristian Vogel etc.

In 1998 Tobias moved from Copenhagen to Manhattan, New York City to make music with artist Neil Landstrumm living in Brooklyn. The two worked successfully together and a few tracks were produced, none of which has been released though.

In 1999 Tobias moved back to Sweden and this time he moved to Stockholm. Here he started up his record store called “illegal Stockholm” and from nothing he built a successful and respected business located in the south parts of Stockholm. It was a good place to meet new people and Tobias soon made friends with the other Stockholm based producers and djs.

While managing the store and organizing parties he continued dj-ing and producing music. In May 2000 Tobias went to Detroit for the first time to Master the first record on what later would become the label “illegal Stockholm”. The mastering and cutting of the vinyl was done at NSC by the legendary Ron Murphy who has been cutting the records for most Detroit labels for ages.

Tobias had great success with his “Swinger” record on Mechanisms Industries, Detroit. The record was charted and played by artists like Surgeon and Adam Beyer etc. It lead to several new remix projects, including remixes of Adam Beyer and Joel Mull for the Drumcode label, Mhonolink on the Mhonday Music label and Marco Lenzi on Eukatech etc…

In 2002 Tobias sold his record store to be able to fully concentrate on his music and on his record label. The releases so far has been very well received and has established Tobias and his illegal Stockholm imprint as a force to be reckoned with in the techno scene worldwide. The third release on illegal Stockholm was the After Hours record, which was licensed to several projects including the Time Warp mixcd by Adam Beyer. Another huge success was the “Burner” track released on the Swedish label Spirit Fuel. The track was considered one of the top tracks of 2002 by many djs and was also licensed to a lot of compilations.

Recently Tobias was asked to remix the “City Life” track by Ben Sims and Mark Broom which was released on Primate 71 together with artists such as Smith & Selway, Mark Williams and Marco Bailey. Currently he’s working on the sixth illegal Stockholm release: “Mecha” which is inspired by Japanese Anime and Tobias’s interest in future technology. Expect this to be another really strong release!

Tobias djs frequently all around the globe and is constantly putting out more music.