About NorthtribE
Northtribe is the creative outlet of Swedish electronic musician John Ekström. It is an ongoing journey that began in the twilight of the 1980s—woven from an upright piano and the flickering, 8-bit melodies of NES games that slowly blossomed into a lifelong devotion to electronic sound.
From early trance and Goa experiments in FastTracker II to deep, atmospheric landscapes in Propellerhead Reason, the sound has drifted across distinct chapters: Nostalgia, New Era, Ostendo, Study Phase, and now, Upprisa. Today, Northtribe stands as a bridge between echoes and horizons—honoring the raw pulse of the early tracker days while moving forward through new music, hypnotic streams, and visual worlds.
Here is how the path unfolds.
Origins (Childhood – 1996)
It began with a piano and an old television.
As a kid, I taught myself to play entirely by ear. I would sit out in the hallway while games like Mario, Zelda, and Metroid echoed from the living room. Waiting for a melody to loop, I would run back to the keys, searching through the notes until the harmony clicked. Those repeating game motifs became my first true music teachers—though I didn’t know it then, that early pull toward sound laid the foundation for everything.
In 1996, a television commercial introduced me to Teknomaker, a basic sampler program. I bought it the next day and started carving out my first loops and beats. Soon after, a friend handed me FastTracker II on a floppy disk, and everything shifted. For the first time, every single note, sample, and minor detail was entirely in my hands. I was completely, irreversibly hooked.
Nostalgia (1996–2000)
Discovering FastTracker II in late 1996 became my true point of origin. By the spring of 1997, the very first complete track took shape.
Around the same time, the internet was beginning to carve its path through Sweden. I found my way into the pulsing tracker and demoscene communities through digital forums and magazines like TEKNO. We connected across servers, swapping .xm and .mod files in a shared digital underground.
Back then, I produced under the alias Cream, moving through trance, Goa, rave, and ambient landscapes. In 1998, I joined my first tracker group, Future Beats, and later moved on to PlastiK until they disbanded in 1999. Under the subsequent alias Pisces, I began uploading music to mp3.com, opening a door to audiences far beyond the local tracker circles. A defining highlight of these years came in 1999, when my track “World of God” landed on the CD compilation Trancepotting 2—a monumental milestone at the time.
This intense first chapter came to a sudden halt in 2001, when a major system crash forced everything to go dark. Yet, those formative years laid the bedrock for my entire workflow and sound.
New Era (2000–2008)
In late 2000, I discovered Propellerhead Reason, and it instantly clicked. Stepping away from the tracker grid into virtual instruments and cable routing felt like a seismic shift. I was no longer restricted to samples—I could build sounds entirely from scratch.
While some friends from the tracker scene made the same leap, the digital landscape was shifting beneath our feet. Platforms like mp3.com and Trax in Space faded away, turning music creation into a more solitary craft, shared mostly with a close circle of friends.
Reason transformed my workflow. Moving away from rigid pattern-based composition allowed me to see the vast architecture of a track. My sound grew deeper, more atmospheric, and structural, leaning heavily into melodic trance, psytrance, and Goa. This mirrored the underground rave culture I inhabited—hidden forest clearings, dark warehouses, and legendary clubs like Docklands, where I witnessed acts like Astral Projection, Infected Mushroom, and Tiësto.
It was during this era that I adopted the name Northtribe. It felt less like a choice and more like a reset. Inspired by the tribal, cosmic currents of the Goa scene fused with my own northern roots, the name simply clicked into place.
Between 2003 and 2006, while studying at university, I stopped releasing music publicly, but the creation never stopped. I composed a soundtrack for a student video project that echoed through the school corridors, and occasionally hearing my own tracks drift out across the student pub floors remained a surreal, electric feeling.
This era came to a close in 2008 when another hardware crash forced me into a second prolonged silence.
Ostendo (2009–2017)
After about a year away, a new computer brought me back to the studio with fresh energy. Much like the previous era, this phase wasn’t driven by public releases. I shared occasional clips on my website, but mostly, I created purely for the joy of the craft.
I produced less frequently, but with sharper focus. Mixes grew tighter, arrangements became more deliberate, and my sound matured as I dug deeper into progressive house and trance. Music simply wove itself into whatever spaces life allowed—quiet evenings, weekends, and fleeting bursts of inspiration. Ideas often remained as unpolished loops or sketches, yet the internal engine never stopped turning.
I eventually named this period Ostendo—a season of quiet, inward expression. The music didn’t necessarily echo out into the world, but it continued to grow roots. In truth, music has been a constant current in my daily life ever since I first touched a piano; it functions almost as a form of meditation.
In time, aging hardware could no longer keep pace with newer iterations of Reason, and technical frustrations eventually led to yet another quiet pause.
Study Phase (2018–2022)
Even though active production slowed down during these years, I was far from idle. After finally upgrading my computer in 2018, I hit a crucial turning point.
Despite all my years of making music, my tracks still lacked that final professional polish found in my favorite releases. I was entirely self-taught—the musical ideas were there, but the sonic clarity wasn’t. Instead of forcing out unfinished tracks, I chose to step back and hit the books.
I spent countless hours diving deep into mixing, mastering, advanced sound design, and modern production techniques. It wasn’t always glamorous work, but it was necessary. I needed to understand not just how to compose, but how to truly shape sound. I was quietly laying down the technical bedrock for everything that was about to follow.
Upprisa (2023–Present)
After years of learning, refining, and working quietly in the shadows, 2023 marked the beginning of a true creative resurgence. I began dusting off, finishing, and releasing tracks from my vast archive—spanning the Nostalgia, New Era, and Ostendo periods—but returning to them with a fresh perspective and a deeply refined sonic landscape.
This time, however, it is about far more than just dropping tracks. It is about building a lasting sanctuary. I rebuilt my website from the ground up, organized my catalog, and began sharing my work properly across platforms like YouTube and Spotify. Step by step, Northtribe is finally taking its true, intended shape.
I call this current chapter Upprisa—a Norse word for resurrection, for rising up once more. The old tracks no longer languish forgotten on hard drives; they have been breathed back into a living, evolving project. At the same time, I am constantly looking toward the horizon with brand-new music, continuous livestreams, and immersive visual concepts.
I don’t create for fame or recognition. I make music simply because it is fundamentally who I am. Upprisa is the culmination of years of patient growth, and an unyielding commitment to keep the music playing.
– John Ekström / Northtribe