As the years go by, the gap between the underground music scene and the fashion world shrinks more and more. While collaborations between the two industries were once taboo in certain corners of the electronic music community––for fear of artists signalling that they'd 'sold out'––in recent years, some of the scene's most praised DJs and producers have been involved in scoring and soundtracking shows for top-tier fashion houses and promising independent designers.

In April 2020, Mugler's fast-paced, jaw-dropping SS21 collection film, soundtracked by Ashland Mines, AKA TOTAL FREEDOM, who previously led the musical direction for Telfar and Helmut Lang, premiered on YouTube. Within days, the film had reached a new level of virality that was a first in the fashion world. Without a doubt, the stellar cast was one of the main attractions, but what left fashion fanatics astounded was the distinctive use of club music on the runway, which took shape via a continuous mix comprised of tracks from Shygirl, Eartheater, Jasmine Infiniti, Neana and Sami Baha. Mines later uploaded the mix to SoundCloud, describing the soundtrack, which took two months to assemble, as "skiing down an active volcano at night. full moon. nude except goggles and boots. feeling gay."

Although a number of producers have seamlessly transitioned into these high fashion-focused projects, crafting a sophisticated soundscape for a fashion crowd is an entirely different task from standing behind the decks. While DJs attract attention in their natural nightclub habitats by drawing in punters eager for the night-long dance floor experience, their contributions to runway music often take a backseat. Unlike sets that play out in dimly-lit clubs with the DJ placed front and center, fashion runway scores allow room for the visual elements, placing focus on the models' attire and struts down the catwalk.

But fashion runway scores and soundtracks within the context of electronic music aren't a phenomenon of the '00s. In fact, the origins can be traced back to the 1960s with composer and BBC Radiophonic Workshop pioneer Delia Derbyshire. Most commonly known for writing the original theme song to cult sci-fi TV show Doctor Who, in 1967, Derbyshire recorded an original score for an ICI-sponsored student fashion show, run in collaboration with the Royal College of Art at Hornsey. The runway music—a mish-mash collection of her original compositional pieces—was combined to create a single continuous soundscape that became the world's first electronic music fashion score.

Somewhere in between Debyshire's monumental score and TOTAL FREEDOM's viral Mugler soundtrack, major fashion houses and designers like Louis Vuitton, Prada, Mugler, Rick Owens and Kenzo picked up on the electronic score trend. And in the early '00s, many pivoted towards commissioning prominent club-centric DJs and producers to be at the helm of the musical direction for their iconic runway shows, following on the heels of the independent artists, designers and labels that paved the way for the rest of the fashion world: Hood By Air, BARRAGÁN, Telfar, Chromat, Dion Lee, GmbH and Ottolinger. Although high-end streetwear designers were some of the first to include club-centric electronic music in their fashion shows, traditional luxury fashion houses were the designers to expose the commercial fashion world to the underground through their collaborations with DJs and producers like Honey Dijon and Nguzunguzu. As the next generation of high-end fashion designers emerges, it feels as though the fashion industry has hit a full circle moment in that, similar to the narrative of Hood By Air, Telfar and Chromat, the designers behind Ottolinger, Dion Lee and GmbH came up in the electronic music scene themselves. The artists they now cite as collaborators are close friends with whom they've shared many hours on sweaty dance floors. What started as a trend turned into an inseparable bond––for both fashion designers and artists. In chronological order, we detail how some of the most influential electronic music soundtrack collaborations to date were made.

SS19 courtesy of Dion Lee

KINGDOM for Hood By Air

In 2006, at a house party somewhere in Los Angeles, FADE TO MIND label head and Tinashe collaborator KINGDOM was approached by fashion designer Telfar Clemens to play at an upcoming party. At that point, KINGDOM didn't DJ or produce. "Telfar actually taught me how to DJ," KINGDOM recalls over a Zoom call in late January. "My very first DJ gig was for him, and then I started playing his party every week." Coming up in LA, KINGDOM—who now counts Opening Ceremony and BARRAGÁN as clients—was part of the fashion scene by default, circulating in tightly overlapping fashion and music circles. Through this small scene, he connected with Hood By Air co-founder and design director Shayne Oliver. Two years after the HBA brand was founded, the American fashion designer called on KINGDOM to soundtrack the Fall/Winter 2008 collection, and later the Spring/Summer 2009 runway show, requesting a dark, tripped out, glitchy bootleg of Jodeci's "Freekn' You" and a club-ready remix of Madonna's "Like A Prayer" titled "Hood By Air Theme." It was later released via Bok Bok and L-Vis 1990's seminal Night Slugs label. "Shayne would send me obscure references, and once he even asked me, 'What would it sound like if there were people voguing on a war battlefield, in the middle of combat?'" he explains. "The task at hand was interpreting the visual into the auditory, which really expanded my notion of what I'm doing with sound. I can get so stuck in my ways, my rhythms and my rituals, so there's nothing like someone from whole different mediums to shake up what I'm doing."

Nguzunguzu for KENZO

Asma Maroof (AKA Asmara) and Daniel Pineda (AKA DJ NA) have been putting out music as the duo Nguzunguzu for over a decade, including releases via KINGDOM's FADE TO MIND imprint. In 2012, the pair made their scoring debut for Kenzo's Fall/Winter show, remixing and reimagining samples from Masters At Work's ballroom anthem "The Ha Dance" as models traversed a series of escalators, ascending with grandeur onto the runway below. After its release in 1991, "The Ha Dance" swept New York's bubbling underground ballroom scene and soon became the soundtrack for voguers walking, battling and competing on behalf of their houses. "I've always said scoring is very much the same muscle as making a mixtape or edits," says Maroof, whose fashion soundtracking portfolio includes shows with Céline and Louis Vuitton. "Just make bomb shit, and people will pay attention."

Aurora Halal for Dion Lee

"Dion said he had been listening to my track "Overpass" while thinking about the collection and was looking for the same trippy and yearning introspective feeling," says Sustain-Release Festival founder Aurora Halal, who soundtracked Dion Lee's SS19 runway show. Known for his rave-ready collections featuring cut-out shapes and a mass of leather, the Australian-born, NYC-based fashion designer always has a sound, track or artist in mind when designing a collection. "All the artists I have worked with have been friends or people who I have met through seeing them play, which makes every season a very organic and intuitive decision," says Lee over email. One of them is Halal, whose set was made by assembling a mix of hazy, brooding techno that conjure up a not-so-distant dystopian future. "I wrote and performed a short three-track live piece that began with an extended version of 'Overpass,' and morphed into a few other tracks that fit the mood." Unlike a lot of fashion projects that nod to various influences, including prominent subcultures, the NYC-based DJ and producer states that Lee is an actual part of the underground nightlife scene, with his clothes being an extension of that. "[The designs] are rhythmic, minimal and gender neutral, and feel like visual techno," she says. While Halal normally wants to create significant, stand-out moments, the soundtrack was more about momentum and mood. "I don't think anyone in the audience cared who made the music or was watching me, and that's really nice—more like an orchestra in the pit for a play or a movie," she recalls.

DION LEE · SS19 RUNWAY - AURORA HALAL

DEBIT for BARRAGÁN

"I became friends with Victor [Barragán] through our mutual friends Mexican Jihad and NAAFI around the time we both moved to NYC," says DJ and producer DEBIT. After connecting over a shared taste in music, she was invited to soundtrack BARRAGÁN's SS19 runway show and, as a result, became a close collaborator on catwalk music and various fashion films for the brand known for its gender-fluid and playful take on clubwear. "Our music curation really just starts within our community," explains Barrágan, who launched his eponymous label in 2016. "Most of our collaborators are our friends in music. We really do play them on high rotation and go see their DJ sets." DEBIT's approach to the narrative arc is usually conventional, with an intro-main body-outro scheme, as music does serve a purpose in the fashion context. While shows are live and tend to be faster and shorter, fashion films often include more original work and feel more nuanced as more people are involved in making the music. "Soundtracking the videos usually involves me submitting the music or the score to the editors that make final cuts," she explains. "Ceasing that control is tricky, but also why the overall product is better and different from a solo thing." For DEBIT, the fashion music collaboration starts with research and being genuinely interested and attentive to what is happening in the industry as a whole. "Have an openness and sensibility to what each brand or designer is doing, and think around those terms," she suggests. "Watch fashion shows online across time, and pay attention to the music and in particular what you liked and why."

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CRYSTALLMESS for Telfar

"The process of working with Telfar was more like working on a crowdsourced and playful, yet high-level, happening," says Paris-based DJ and producer Crystallmess, who live-scored the brand's SS20 first-ever runway show, The world isn't everything. The piece was presented as a film screening and series of video works accompanied by a performance from Klein. The eponymous fashion film, starring Steve Lacy, Ashton Sanders and Dean Blunt, among others, played with the idea of placelessness and the crude reality of monitoring and surveillance. "[Playwright] Jeremy O. Harris and I wrote a monologue of a TSA woman asking questions about citizenship, previous countries visited and all the questions you are asked when you are applying for a visitor visa," she continues. "It was my first time using my voice on a track, and I used my Arp Odyssey and some other synths to create an eerie airport atmosphere." Although she already knew of Clemens's work and had seen him around the club, the two were only properly introduced in June 2019 when they showed up for her set at the underground party Filles de Blédards. "At the end of my set, they told me how much he loved it and asked for my contact, so we can work on a special project," recalls Crystallmess, who has created music for Jean Paul Gaultier, Marni, Telfar and Berlin-based fashion brand Ottolinger. "The reason why I'm telling this story is that the encounter happened [...] in my natural habitat, which is the club." In fact, many fashion designers have a personal connection to club culture. Clemens, for instance, used to be a DJ, and told CBS that the price of his iconic Telfar bag is based on the fee he would get for playing a set. Knowing people is definitely a plus when breaking into fashion scoring, but according to Crystallmess, it also helps to concentrate on the people around you and score your friends' projects, whether they're films, presentations or performances. "Build your sound whether you're a DJ or a producer or both, insist on the narrative and cinematic aspects," she suggests.

BEARCAT for CHROMAT

New York-based DJ and producer BEARCAT connected with Discwoman's Umfang through a Berlin flatshare before becoming a permanent member of the collective in 2015. BEARCAT met Becca McCharen-Tran, creative director of future-forward bodywear CHROMAT, through DW and was invited to soundtrack her brand's legendary shows, which have previously seen Juliana Huxtable, DJ HARAM, Suzi Analogue, SHYBOI, Mobilegirl, Riobamba and UNiiQU3 helm the musical direction. McCharen-Tran has always felt a strong connection to the music scene. "The club is where I kind of came up" she recounts from her home in Miami over video call. "That was my community when I first moved to New York." BEARCAT's mix for the Chromat 10th anniversary AW20 show includes upwards of 40 tracks, built on a narrative that revolves around pep rallies, a NASA launch and alien abductions. Reflecting on her process behind the soundtrack, BEARCAT explains, "My sound can be quite dark and horror-focused, and this soundtrack gave me a chance to play more fun, high-energy and nostalgic tracks I wouldn't usually get to play in my club sets. It was refreshing to be given a brief, follow a set narrative and tap into a more artistic, conceptual approach." In general, there's no secret trick to land a fashion gig, so instead, many artists recommend concentrating on the stuff you're already doing. "Before any of these opportunities arise, people will first recognize you for your style as a producer or DJ," says BEARCAT. "Explore and lean into that, make mixes, experiment and play with the possibilities and different concepts like you've already been given the task to score a show." Oftentimes, it's about simply looking at your immediate surroundings first rather than shooting for the stars.

BEARCAT for CHROMAT

Plastikman for Prada

Richie Hawtin, AKA Plastikman, met Belgian fashion designer Raf Simons at the '90s party 10 Days of Techno. "Raf is a huge electronic music fan and over the years we collaborated on a series of projects with some other fashion houses that he was leading," says Hawtin over email. "The Prada collaboration was something 20 years in the making." When Simons joined Miuccia Prada as co-creative director in April 2020, Hawtin provided the soundtrack for the Italian luxury house's first virtual show. "The music for the women's SS21 collection 'Sin Thetik' came out of our discussions of what identity might be in the future, which pushed me to use AI-spoken names for each of the models," he explains further. For him, combining music and fashion brings together sight and sound and creates something that seems more real and impactful. "Music is a type of fashion that we wrap around ourselves each time we play something for others, communicating the emotions, themes and ideas we find important and want to project," he explains further. Since then, the minimal techno enthusiast has been scoring their AW21, and SS22 runway show and working on the "Prada Extends" project, inviting musicians worldwide into the Prada family. For Hawtin, it's all about understanding that you are only a piece of the puzzle. "Your music is there to support the collection and help strengthen and support the emotions and ideals that the designers are trying to convey," he explains. "If you can understand and accept that, then there's real magic in this type of challenging collaboration."

LABOUR for GmbH

GmbH's Benjamin Alexander Huseby and Serhat Işık contacted LABOUR, the sonic duo of Farahnaz Hatam and Colin Hacklander, through mutual friends. They became long-term collaborators with the community-driven fashion brand born on Berlin's dance floors, producing original music for three of their latest runway shows–: Welt am Draht (AW21), White Noise (SS22) and Talisman (AW22). "Creating music for GmbH gives us the chance to explore parts of ourselves and our music in new ways," says the duo about their collaborations, which always start with the brand's creative directors sharing the concept with them. "We see their sketches and feel the materials, and begin to exchange texts, authors or influences." Only then, LABOUR takes their ideas to the studio to work on new music that feels future-oriented and traditional at the same time, reflecting GmbH's values through a mix of electronics and instrumentals. "LABOUR is interested in collaborators with greater visions, and this we find in GmbH, whose own vision extends beyond producing a clothing line, and resonates on the same spectrum that a social movement might," the duo explains. "Real changes come not only in hearts and minds, but in structures, and we should look good as we go about changing the world."

LABOUR for GmbH

Words by Claire Mouchemore and Juule Kay