Hiroko Yamamura Credit: Courtesy the Artist

The organizers behind Mamby on the Beach understand electronic music: its history, how it intersects with a panoply of other genres, and its future. The Sunday lineup for the dance-music tent at the annual festival this June included a headlining set by minimal techno titan Richie Hawtin and an opening set from veteran Chicago techno producer and DJ Hiroko Yamamura. She’s as embedded in the local dance scene as anyone can be—she routinely spins at hot spots such as Spybar, Sound Bar, and Smart Bar, and she’s also in with foundational house label Trax (which recently issued a digital compilation, That’s What I Call Trax! Volume 1, that features her 2016 single “Moon Rocks”). The material she’s released this year includes a couple collaborations with Angel Alanis (“Jacare” for Chuck Daniels Presents: Sampled Sixteen V. 1 and a remix of Lauren Flax and DJ Heather’s “The Acid”) as well as a set for Smart Bar resident Jeff Derringer’s Oktave Records podcast. Throughout it all, Yamamura cuts bubbling synths with percussion that shocks like static electricity—these dark streaks both color her music and give her tracks an adrenalized boost.   v

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