Run by four producers, Robokid, Hunt for the Breeze, AO Beats and Manila Killa, Moving Castle embodies a lot of what is exciting about dance music right now- it’s born in the heart of the internet, it’s culturally aware and most importantly, innovative. While together, they are being called a kawaii bass collective, their individual musical output is strikingly different. Between them, they oscillate from the kitsch, to the industrial with trap influences peppered in between. AO Beats puts it best when he says, “All of us have pretty similar taste in music but all have some unique stylistic characteristics that I think make the collective work well.”

The feel of Moving Castle echoes that of physical music communities like the London grime scene or the rising Australian electronica scene, except the community is born online. Once, you’d start your career through hitting the clubs and getting your name out there by word of mouth but Moving Castle are proving it can be done the opposite way round. The four creators made their name online and have only recently started putting on club nights as Moving Castle and coming together as a tangible entity.

Their approach to releasing music feels as modern as their sound. Just by looking at their SoundCloud you can gauge a feel for how entrenched in music they are. Rarely, does a week go by where they are not reposting music or releasing some of their own. Each pushing the boundary just a little further whether it be by speeding up the tempo, tampering with the pitch or experimenting with beats. Their manager Brett Blackman seems to be drowning in new music. His Soundcloud is a goldmine of new electronic music, each week releasing a weekend playlist in excess of 30 songs. Given the fast-paced nature of new music online, it’s impressive to see a collective deeply aware of what’s going on around them and yet still boundary-bushing in terms of their individual output.