Famba

In his youth, Famba—a.k.a. Halifax, Canada’s Ryan Pettipas—gravitated toward rock and metal. But in 2016, his father introduced him to deadmau5’s music, and there was no looking back. The very next year, he broke through with “Vibe,” a tropical-house slow-burner coproduced with Frank Pierce and featuring singer Emily Bonabon, and before long his catalog was filling up with records for top EDM labels like Spinnin’ and Armada. A self-taught guitarist and drummer, the Toronto-based DJ brings a healthy dose of melody to everything he touches. From the beginning, he’s been interested in combining pop hooks with electronic grooves—a fusion that’s particularly audible in the acoustic guitar of “Swear to God” or the soaring chorus of “I Feel Your Pain”. But in 2021, he told interviewers that for the foreseeable future, he’d be concentrating on house music, pure and simple; he marked the shift with heads-down floor-fillers like “Still Call You Mine” and “Games We Play”.