Sander van Doorn

DJ magazine's number 32-ranked DJ in the world is a relative newcomer whose reputation borders on the messianic. In 2004 Sander van Doorn began to focus more on DJing and less on production, the field in which he'd been working under names like Sam Sharp, Purple Haze, and Filterfunk. In no time the 27-year-old Dutchman was wowing crowds and peers alike with crunchily distorted strains of techno and club-bliss electronica.

His groundbreaking track came in 2005, a techno reupholstering of the Police's "Message in a Bottle." In it Sting's vocal effect is set to full reverb as it faces down van Doorn's swirling, parched layers. The tune wound up getting speaker love from just about every DJ who mattered, the accolades began pouring in, and van Doorn's name began getting mentioned in the same breath as the term new breed of dance DJ. Such hyperbole earns its subject the microscope treatment, of course. The key is this: You seriously never know what he'll do next. His 2007 singles "Grasshopper" and "Riff" are a huge switch from what fans have come to expect. Slower, trippier, and deeper than his previous material, this stuff is the closest he has come to pure Berlin techno.