Mr. Annand

Ben Annand fell into LA's electronic scene in 1995 and learned to mix the following year, buying his first records at a shop in Edinburgh, Scotland, that summer. Two years later he became a resident DJ at Moontribe, the long-running Southern California desert gathering, and started his own party, Tropical, the same year.

His first international gig came in Quito, Ecuador, in January 1999, followed by a Moontribe tour of Canada that summer and repeated trips to Mexico City's Club Rimel in 2000. He went on to play Moscow's Propaganda club more than a dozen times, Wiggle at Fabric in London, and the Labyrinth Festival in Japan twice.

Tropical has grown from a warehouse party into boat parties and a retreat series across California, Oregon, Washington, and Hawaii, and Annand left a 15-year teaching career in 2018 to DJ full time.