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Biography
Regarded upon his 2006 arrival as a promising beatmaker looming in the shadows of J Dilla, Madlib, and Dabrye, Steven Ellison -- known as Flying Lotus -- nullified all comparisons only two years later with Los Angeles. On that album, his first of five for the Warp label, Ellison distilled a uniquely crisp, spasmodic, and heady sound with elements of hip-hop, avant-garde jazz, IDM, and dubstep. While the abovementioned producers fueled Ellison, he had also been excited as a youngster by the '90s West Coast rap classics that combined programming and live instrumentation. His sound continued to develop as he put his own twist on the approach, recording with a crop of jazz musicians including the indispensable likes of bassist Thundercat and strings master Miguel Atwood-Ferguson. This process began with the turbulent 2010 set Cosmogramma and peaked in terms of acclaim in 2014 with You're Dead!, which crashed the Top 20 of the Billboard 200 and spawned the Kendrick Lamar collaboration "Never Catch Me," a Grammy nominee for Best Dance Recording. Ellison devoted a few years to various forms of film work and the operation of his revered Brainfeeder label, and returned in 2019 with Flamagra, his second consecutive album to top Billboard's Dance/Electronic chart. After he was Grammy-nominated for Producer of the Year, he provided the score for the 2021 anime series Yasuke.
Steven Ellison was born in Los Angeles and raised in the city's Winnetka neighborhood. He is the grandson of Marilyn McLeod, a songwriter and producer known for co-writing hits such as Diana Ross' "Love Hangover" and Jermaine Jackson's "Let Me Tickle Your Fancy." Additionally, Ellison is the grand-nephew of visionary jazz artists Alice Coltrane (McLeod's sister) and John Coltrane. His cousins include Ravi and Oran Coltrane, the latter of whom introduced him to electronic music production and gave him his first piece of gear, a Roland MC-505 groovebox. Drawn first to filmmaking -- he made stop-motion clips in his youth, using action figures and a camcorder -- Ellison obtained a degree from Los Angeles Film School and continued at the Academy of Art in San Francisco. After a short period in the Bay Area, he returned to L.A. and in 2004 started working as an intern for Peanut Butter Wolf's Stones Throw label, which enabled him to cross paths with inspirations such as J Dilla and Madlib. All the while, Ellison had continued to work on music, particularly taken with the Akai MPC sampler. In response to an open call from Cartoon Network's Adult Swim programming block, Ellison submitted tracks, and soon had them licensed for use between segments and commercial breaks.
