Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on February 2012

He’s penned songs for Kylie Minogue, toured with Rihanna and been publicly dissed by Katy Perry, so he must be important, right? Calvin Harris, “the Caledonian Justin Timberlake,” represents a new era of DJ/producers who came of age when Fatboy Slim-type superstar DJs were the norm. But writing and singing his own tracks, he takes it one step further.

Before Harris’s 2007 hit debut album I Created Disco, things were not looking so bright for the skinny Scot. The unemployed 23-year-old was posting tracks from his bedroom studio at his parents’ house in rural Scotland to MySpace. But it didn’t take long for Harris’s natural gift of composing dancefloor fillers to shine. Picked up by Sony in 2006, I Created Disco was soon tearing up the charts on the strengths, among others, of the lovingly snide 80s tribute, “Acceptable in the 80s.”

With his knack for pacing tracks with perfectly timed climaxes and breakdowns, Harris was soon sought by Minogue and Dizzy Rascal et al to pen songs for them. Among such hits are two number ones singles: Rascal’s “Dance wiv Me” and Rihanna’s “We Found Love,” while his own follow-up album Ready for the Weekend topped the charts in the UK.

Harris follows up a rapturously received 2010 Summer Sonic debut with an unusual back-to-back booking at Shibuya superclubs Womb and Vision. Clubs typically protect their ability to draw an audience with exclusive bookings—the fact that Womb and Vision agreed to host Harris on successive nights is indicative of their belief in his appeal to the Japanese audience.

Womb, Feb 24 and Vision, Feb 25 (listing).