Virtual Riot

A bass laboratory that defined recent dubstep

Virtual Riot's sound design has become one of the most recognizable signatures in dubstep over the last decade: hyper-detailed bass, surgical transitions, and a keyboard musicality that doesn't hide the piano. Born in Marl, in North Rhine-Westphalia, he grew up between piano lessons, church organ, and a borrowed DAW. He later studied music production in Mannheim and began uploading tracks to SoundCloud until the label Phantom Hertz Recordings released the EP From Space in 2011, the starting gun for a catalog that already mixed dubstep, riddim, future bass, electro house, and drum and bass.

Phantom Hertz, Disciple, and the visa that changed the map

After Superhuman with Amba Shepherd and the album There Goes Your Money (2013), he signed in 2014 with the British label Disciple Recordings. The EP We're Not Alone arrived before he turned 21, he secured his visa, and moved to Los Angeles, where he shared an apartment with Barely Alive and Dubloadz. He strung together club and festival releases—Nightmare, Machinery, Chemistry (No. 20 on the Billboard Dance/Electronic Albums chart), and German Engineering (No. 11 in digital dance/electronic sales)—and in 2017 he opened a more melodic chapter with the EP Still Kids. On April 16, 2019, he announced a publishing deal with OWSLA. In parallel, his YouTube tutorials, Patreon, and Splice packs turned him into a producer-teacher whose palette is heard in countless other artists' drops.

Simulation at the Palladium and the jump to Monstercat

Simulation, his first studio album, was released on September 10, 2021, on Disciple and toured the United States until selling out the Hollywood Palladium on April 22, 2022. Outside the bass scene, he participated in Justin Bieber's 2 Much, which was nominated for a Grammy, and was a songwriter for Skrillex and Swae Lee's Mixed Signals. On October 18, 2024, he released Stealing Fire on Monstercat, featuring Give in to you alongside Rezz and One True God. In 2025, he mixed and mastered Skrillex's album FUS and signed tracks with DJ Diesel (Shaquille O'Neal) and Ray Volpe.

Live keyboard, Neurite, and Burning Out

On stage, he puts on an audiovisual show with VJ Neurite on the decks, live keyboard, and a production designed for EDC, Rampage, Tomorrowland, Lost Lands, and the Insomniac circuit. On April 9, 2026, Burning Out arrived, his third album, also on Monstercat, with collaborations with Eliminate, Viperactive, Blanke, Said The Sky, or YDG, and a live tour that positions him as a producer-performer rather than a USB DJ. That balance between the laboratory, the festival, and pedagogy is his current position in the international bass scene.