alt.hn

7/29/2026 at 11:54:37 AM

French musician Kavinsky found dead

 https://www.euronews.com/culture/2026/07/29/dj-kavinsky-known-for-his-track-nightcall-found-dead-at-his-paris-home

by bristleworm

7/29/2026 at 1:50:11 PM

I ran a fairly popular electronic music blog [1] in France between 2009 and 2014 and met him multiple times. I’m really sad he’s no longer with us. He was an icon of this bloghouse era with the Ed Banger crew. Rest in peace Vinco, you’ll be missed.

I can’t say I’m surprised though as most DJs during that era were known to abuse all kinds of substances and had to manage a non existent sleep schedule, long flights all around the world, and jet lag. It takes a toll on your body.

The entire industry is sharing stories about him today and The Toxic Avenger (Simon) shared a funny one about a set in Zurich https://x.com/toxavanger/status/2082434657300177372

[1] https://www.stopthenoise.fr/

by nicolas_

7/29/2026 at 2:41:17 PM

Definitely linked to you many times (I ran a blog called ilictronix in high school). Small world! Great posts over the years.

by jordanscales

7/29/2026 at 3:06:41 PM

Thank you! Small world indeed! I’m glad the blog resonated with people as much as it did. I shared mp3 with friends back then and firmly believed that more people in France and around the world would love the same music as much as we did. Kudos for still posting on yours after all the years. That’s an insane feat! I really wished I kept going but starting my career in Paris in 2014 killed the momentum. I worked on the blog from 6pm to midnight pretty much every day after school and couldn’t do the same once I started working. I’ll bring it back one day! In the meantime, I’ll definitely check ilictronix. Thanks for sharing with the world. Love the MySpace like personal website with flat Eric!

by nicolas_

7/29/2026 at 3:47:51 PM

Ah ! So it was you... I have like 300 mp3s from your blog. Also, Fluokids.

by JodieBenitez

7/29/2026 at 7:53:10 PM

Yes! I don’t know how many mp3s I shared on it but definitely a lot! It was wild to be able to do this with the support of the artists and the labels. I’m glad you still have them (I do too). The blog is still online if you want a trip down memory lane but sadly the download links are not. Thanks for being part of the adventure and sorry for messing up the ID3 tags of each mp3.

by nicolas_

7/29/2026 at 2:57:09 PM

Mais non ! J'ai toujours été attristé par la fin de Stop The Noise. Aucune intention de rallumer le flambeau ? :)

by w23n

7/29/2026 at 3:11:55 PM

Haha le crossover HN improbable ! C’était une fin sans vraiment l’être. Je n’ai jamais vraiment fermé le chapitre. L’intention a toujours été la, plein de fois pour être franc. Encore plus récemment. J’ai envie de faire ça bien donc ça prendra un peu de temps mais l’envie est clairement là :)

by nicolas_

7/29/2026 at 6:32:56 PM

you and hypemachine helped fill my ipod and car stereo. thank you!

by nekooooo

7/29/2026 at 7:57:07 PM

Oh I loved Hypem! I actually visited the website again yesterday and found a cool track within 10s. It’s still alive and kicking. For some reasons, they never accepted my submission to have STN on it. Thanks for being a part of the adventure and I hope you still have those mp3s.

by nicolas_

7/29/2026 at 12:38:59 PM

He's rightly credited as having participated in the popularization of the musical and visual "Synthwave" aesthetic:

https://aesthetics.fandom.com/wiki/Synthwave

by teroshan

7/29/2026 at 1:32:45 PM

There’s a while sub genre of synthwave named after his album OutRun. Which, by the way, is best experienced while driving on the highway at night.

https://www.reddit.com/r/outrun/

by taejavu

7/29/2026 at 2:09:07 PM

Synthwave genre named after the video game Out Run.

by uncivilized

7/29/2026 at 2:41:32 PM

Is it possible that both the album and the genre are named after the video game? or it could be some kind of chain (genre->album->video game)

Now i just want to play outrun. I wonder if there's an arcade nearby...

by bigfishrunning

7/29/2026 at 2:56:05 PM

The videogame is from the '80s; it became iconic partially because it allowed players to choose the music to listen to "in the car", all of them synths (obviously), and one of the songs you could choose was called "Splash Wave".

Folks like Kavinsky later (re)popularized synths and made explicit throwbacks to the game, like the album name. I don't know where the term "Synthwave" came from, but it does look like one of those throwbacks.

by toyg

7/29/2026 at 3:57:13 PM

Synthwave name is more likely to be related various "wave" genres, like Darkwave or Coldwave.

by where-group-by

7/29/2026 at 5:50:48 PM

Maybe most recognizable: New Wave

by iaaan

7/29/2026 at 2:23:01 PM

I'm only just now realizing that Beach House [1] might also have picked up on that synth aesthetic because the lead singer's father is French and she was in Paris for school in the early 2000s before coming back to the states to go to Vassar (she went to school with some of my friends). It probably was percolating around Paris at that time.

But also 80s synths were just really cheap around then. I picked up a Juno 60 with a flight case for around $400, including shipping, in about 2002.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beach_House

by throwforfeds

7/29/2026 at 2:43:53 PM

Interesting theory, but fwiw synths were quite popular among the Baltimore music scene throughout the 00s. Besides Beach House, there was Dan Deacon, Future Islands, Celebration, among others. Lake Trout was another example, although a few years earlier / different scene. Ditto with Cex.

by evanelias

7/29/2026 at 4:08:26 PM

Oh yeah, absolutely. There were tons here in Brooklyn as well, probably because you could pick up a DX7 or a Juno for a few hundred dollars. No one wanted them. I remember one guy gave me a Wurlitzer 200 for free when I went to pickup a Rhodes from him because he just didn't want it.

But yeah, I still wonder if she was aware of that scene when she was in Paris or not.

by throwforfeds

7/29/2026 at 12:53:26 PM

Loved "Nightcall", shame to lose him. It was a was a happy surprise to see him get a feature at the 2024 closing ceremonies, RIP.

by creaghpatr

7/29/2026 at 2:23:26 PM

His Nightcall performance during the 2024 Paris Olympics closing ceremony got me into Synthwave. Really sad to see him go :(

by sha-3

7/29/2026 at 2:38:47 PM

Between letting Kavinsky play at the closing ceremony [0] and Gojira play at the opening ceremony [1], I really can't applaud and thank Thomas Jolly enough for directing the 2024 Olympic ceremonies.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSayp2tArqA

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8Iv5kq93K4

by teroshan

7/29/2026 at 2:46:09 PM

That Gojira opening has been the most EPIC ceremony I've seen anywhere.

I remember I got so excited that I started jumping on my couch and accidentally knocked over a stand with my collectibles and food. Five-second rule, so I still ate my nuggets afterward, hehe. My partner complained a lot, but... some of these things... only a few of us get. Gojira is definitely not for everybody. It's an acquired taste that only a select few of us get to enjoy.

by moralestapia

7/29/2026 at 12:36:26 PM

Nightcall was kind of the anthem of my life for my early 20s. Still captures a moment. RIP.

by reedf1

7/29/2026 at 12:44:25 PM

I'm a big fan of french electro and Kavinsky is no exception: I discovered him and his Nightcall hit through the soundtrack of the movie Drive.

IIRC he got into electronic music late in his life after a friend gave him a long-outdated Atari ST running Cubase (DAW).

RIP.

by TacticalCoder

7/29/2026 at 12:58:58 PM

Same here! Any recommendations for newer french electro artists?

by technics256

7/29/2026 at 1:54:04 PM

Carpenter Brut

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9e7gmwejeGr7aqhn9A4h...

Maxime Dangles

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsyQZip5xLI

Arnaud Rebotini

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKRfDdsPewQ

Terence Fixmer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqPzHloXppc

Mödern (6 & 7 are good too IMO)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lbZzeBe_JQ&list=PLmmhQqegVx...

Lazerhawk - Redline (not french but my favourite Synthwave album)

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLYc-KHaHGswVjvp4UuqBY...

by scns

7/29/2026 at 1:14:48 PM

Wouldn’t say newer as have been around a while but French79 (start with Hometown) are brilliant.

by noir_lord

7/29/2026 at 1:22:26 PM

+1 for French79, especially his album “Olympic” (2016)

by iammjm

7/29/2026 at 1:12:50 PM

I enjoy Vitalic, not sure if he's newer but has decent body of work :)

by NikolaNovak

7/29/2026 at 1:31:14 PM

Newer is not specifically it since I'm getting a bit too "old / nostalgia" now, but here is a small list (songs chosen are not specifically their biggest but ones I like to come back to)

French79

- Hometown https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAv5pLO37mE

NTO

- Invisible https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xFIcEwCPWZ8

Worakls

- Trauma Worakls Remix https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6QFfmwFT3k&list=RDf6QFfmwFT...

- Salzburg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tTber0f8qc&list=RD_tTber0f8...

Uppermost

- sooo many ... Dance is iconic to me https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TeOByrJgak

- Flashback https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZAECHHJ8U4

- but his Revolution album gives a good walk around https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=83zdpv_ovow

Gesaffelstein

- Hate or Glory https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_NgkfRmUPk

- Viol https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYtpobVmYY4

M83

- you probably already know them, but Outro https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eyjj8BgsBGU

Danger

- 4h30 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YVUo4W4XFiI (my personnal king of "you had to be there", thus a live music exemple)

Justice

- Stress (warning it and its clip are true to its name, it got awards, it got also banned from primetime) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QWaWsgBbFsA

- D.A.N.C.E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sy1dYFGkPUE

Or a ton more really, JM Jarre / Daft Punk / David Guetta really help breed an insane french electro scene each on their own way.

EDIT: in a Kavinsky thread I feel like I should include

Carpenter Brut

- Turbo Killer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=er416Ad3R1g

- Le Perv https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYtVf0wvPpc

Pertubator

- Future Club (you know it from Hotline Miami) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RY66fdMt4vc

by nolok

7/29/2026 at 1:36:14 PM

Danger and justice! Great mentions!

by nosmokewhereiam

7/29/2026 at 3:29:03 PM

I really like ANORAAK

by ricardobayes

7/29/2026 at 1:03:13 PM

Not exactly new but newer, Polo and Pan are great.

by johnsutor

7/29/2026 at 1:35:08 PM

Adding Lewis Ofman, Sebastian and Paradis

by shaoner

7/29/2026 at 1:30:10 PM

It really hit a specific vibe. RIP to a legend.

by hypendev

7/29/2026 at 12:51:51 PM

Oh non :(

Sa musique est une source d’inspiration fantastique, c’est vraiment une triste nouvelle

by dgellow

7/29/2026 at 1:49:14 PM

Encore un que je regrette de ne pas avoir vu. RIP Kavinsky.

by Dependance

7/29/2026 at 6:06:34 PM

Amazing artist. Thanks for all the work. Rip

by tetrisgm

7/29/2026 at 4:06:00 PM

Oh man, I just started listening to him a few months ago after a recommendation from a colleague.

by NDlurker

7/29/2026 at 12:20:45 PM

Didn't realize he was in his 50s.

Darn shame.

by negativezone

7/29/2026 at 3:13:53 PM

Aktchually 50s start at age 51

by ttoinou

7/29/2026 at 3:31:04 PM

I'd say they start at 49, as that is the beginning of your 50th year.

by SoftTalker

7/29/2026 at 3:48:50 PM

get enough software people in a room and everything becomes the fencepost problem.

by ratelimitsteve

7/29/2026 at 1:39:20 PM

And here I thought today couldn't get any worse. :(

by mikedd

7/29/2026 at 4:06:57 PM

look on the bright side, at least you still have internet!

(and here would be a great time for Murphy's Law to kick in and your router to decide to stop working all of a sudden)

by achenet

7/29/2026 at 1:21:40 PM

He was a whole aesthetic and genre. Love his music!

Rest in peace.

by slicktux

7/29/2026 at 3:21:24 PM

RIP. Loved this mans music

by nahimn

7/29/2026 at 12:59:43 PM

A true loss for synthwave music. His music was amazing and rich and exciting in a way that many artists fail to reach.

by usernamed7

7/29/2026 at 2:02:20 PM

Starcardian also died this year - killed in a road accident whilst cycling

by jbreckmckye

7/29/2026 at 2:48:42 PM

Damn didn't know that. I might be the top listener of Interspace on the planet. RIP

by jimmygrapes

7/29/2026 at 4:04:00 PM

A huge loss for synthwave. Thank you for all of the trips back to a more hopeful time in technology.

by lenerdenator

7/29/2026 at 12:25:54 PM

Terrible news. His retro-synth sound was amazing. Had tickets to see him live many years ago and he cancelled the tour.

by xvxvx

7/29/2026 at 1:23:02 PM

is there any news or speculation on how ?

by KageFX

7/29/2026 at 1:27:54 PM

"The Paris prosecutor's office said that "an investigation to establish the causes of death" had been opened, noting that no suspect was found at the scene on Tuesday evening."

Its a strange announcement.

by datakan

7/29/2026 at 1:41:11 PM

It's a mistranslation, the original quote is "Une enquête en recherche des causes de la mort est ouverte afin de déterminer l’origine du décès, aucun élément suspect n’ayant été découvert sur place par les services primo-intervenants. Les investigations sont en cours", which translates to "no suspicious element was found", not "no suspect was found"

by n_e

7/29/2026 at 1:42:00 PM

Thanks for clarifying

by datakan

7/29/2026 at 1:38:33 PM

Purely speculative but he's been known for his excessive drinking for a while now, sad news.

by Zealotux

7/29/2026 at 3:50:40 PM

Authorities believe it was a stroke, he had been complaining of headaches for several days prior.

by wonderwonder

7/29/2026 at 4:19:34 PM

RIP ... loved his work.

Glen Hansard gone too.

Shit day for music. But they'll always live on from their incredible contributions.

by LightBug1

7/29/2026 at 3:51:49 PM

[dead]

by HHalvi

7/29/2026 at 3:01:35 PM

[flagged]

by gizajob

7/29/2026 at 3:31:42 PM

> How is this hacker news?

If it wasn't, it would've been flagged or not voted up, and you wouldn't be here complaining about it. :-P

> Hundreds of musicians died today.

Whom? With the status of Kavinsky?

by runjake

7/29/2026 at 3:12:07 PM

> Hundreds of musicians died today.

source?

by dc3k