Tasha Baxter (born 2 July 1981) is a South African singer-songwriter. Baxter has 5 South African Music Awards nominations and won "Best Pop Album" and "Newcomer of the Year" for her album "Colour of Me". Baxter is most well known in South Africa for her debut solo studio album " Colour of Me" on

EMI EMI Group Limited (formerly EMI Group plc until 2007; originally an initialism for Electric and Musical Industries, also referred to as EMI Records or simply EMI) was a British transnational conglomerate founded in March 1931 in London. At t ...

. Internationally Baxter became prominent for her collaborations in the

Electronic dance music Electronic dance music (EDM), also referred to as dance music or club music, is a broad range of percussive electronic music genres originally made for nightclubs, raves, and List of electronic dance music festivals, festivals. It is generally ...

and

Drum & Bass Drum and bass (commonly abbreviated as DnB, D&B, or D'n'B) is a genre of electronic dance music characterised by fast breakbeats (typically 165–185 beats per minute) with heavy bass and sub-bass lines, samples, and synthesizers. The genre ...

scenes. Multiple of Baxter's collaborations reached number one or top positions on the

Beatport Beatport is an American electronic music-oriented online music store owned by LiveStyle. The company is based in Denver, Los Angeles, and Berlin. Beatport is oriented primarily towards disk jockey, DJs, selling full songs as well as resources that ...

charts such as "Snowblind" with Au5 and "Cloudburn" with Feed Me and on the Top 40 UK singles charts with "In the Beginning" with

Roger Goode Roger Goode is a South African DJ. Biography Goode rose to local fame for his first single "In The Beginning", which featured on 5FM's Top 40. This led to him signing with a local dance record label, SheerDance, under which he released his ...

Early life

Baxter was born on 2 July 1981 in Cape Town, South Africa. She learnt to play piano at a young age and sang in the school choir. At 12 years old her father taught her how to play guitar on steel

twelve string guitar A twelve-string guitar (or 12-string guitar) is a steel-string guitar with 12 strings in six courses, which produces a thicker, more ringing tone than a standard six-string guitar. Typically, the strings of the lower four courses are tuned in ...

. She played in local bands as a teenager while developing her musical talents, playing in a Christian metal band as well as singing and performing with local drum & bass DJ's such as Counterstrike.

Career

2002–2006: In the Beginning

When Baxter was 18 she met and became good friends with South African DJ and radio personality

. This led to their breakthrough in the international music charts with "In the Beginning" in 2002. "In the Beginning" made the local radio

Top 40 In the music industry, the Top 40 is a list of the 40 currently most popular songs in a particular genre. It is the best-selling or most frequently broadcast popular music. Record charts have traditionally consisted of a total of 40 songs. "To ...

charts and was number one on

Pete Tong Peter Michael Tong (born 30 July 1960) is an English DJ who works for BBC Radio 1. He is the host of programmes such as '' Essential Mix'' and '' Essential Selection'' on the radio service, which can be heard through Internet radio streams, for ...

's Essential Mix radio show and later saw remixes by

Ferry Corsten Ferry Corsten OON (; born 4 December 1973) is a Dutch DJ, record producer and remixer. He is well known for producing many pioneering trance tracks during the 1990s–2000s under his numerous aliases, including System F, Moonman, Pulp Victim an ...

and

Gabriel & Dresden Gabriel & Dresden is an American electronic music duo comprising Josh Gabriel and Dave Dresden, formed in San Francisco, California. They collaborated from 2001 to 2008, then again from 2011 to the present. During that time, they have created nu ...

. The Ferry Corsten remix reached number 33 on the UK Singles Charts.

2006–2009: Colour of Me

Baxter continued performing in the dance music scene and playing at local drum and bass events. She then met

Noisia Noisia was a Dutch electronic music trio from Groningen, Netherlands. The trio was composed of Nik Roos, Martijn van Sonderen, and Thijs de Vlieger. Their music spanned several genres, including drum and bass, dubstep, breakbeat, and house. They ...

in 2006 and went to Holland to work on her solo album with the Dutch trio. The album was written by Baxter and her co-writer Andre Scheepers. The album was signed to

South African division. ' Colour of Me' was released in 2007 on CD only and did not have a digital and world-wide release until 2020 provided by

Universal Music Group Universal Music Group N.V. (often abbreviated as UMG and referred to as Universal Music Group or Universal Music) is a Netherlands, Dutch–United States, American multinational Music industry, music corporation under Law of the Netherlands, ...

. Baxter toured extensively throughout this time, performing at the biggest local festivals such as Oppikoppi, Rocking the Daisies, RAMFest. The singles from the album, "Who's Sorry Now", "The Journey", "Useless" and "Fade To Black" made the South African radio top charts list. "The Journey" and "Don't Believe in Love" appeared in the 2009 South African film, "

White Wedding A white wedding is a traditional formal wear, formal or semi-formal wear, semi-formal wedding originating in Great Britain. The term originates from the white colour of the wedding dress, popularised by Victorian era elites after Queen Victoria ...

". The "Colour of Me" album was nominated for 4

South African Music Awards The South African Music Awards (often simply the SAMAs) are the Recording Industry of South Africa's music industry awards, established in 1995. The ceremony is held annually, usually in late April or May, with the judging process starting in ...

and won 2 with 'Best Newcomer' and 'Best Pop Album (English)'. In 2008, Baxter appeared on "Cooking Magic" season 2, by Urban Brew Studios, SABC, a cooking show aimed towards children with celebrity guests as entertainers. At the 15th annual SAMA awards, Loyiso's "Blow your Mind" featuring Tasha Baxter was nominated for MTN Record of the year, adding to Baxter's SAMA nominations. In October 2009 Tasha Baxter appeared on "Tropika Island of Treasure" season 2 reality gameshow on national television alongside other South African celebrities such as

Trevor Noah Trevor Noah (born 20 February 1984) is a South African comedian, writer, producer, political commentator, actor, and television host. He was the host of ''The Daily Show'', an American late-night talk show and satirical news program on Comedy ...

, Loyiso Bala and was hosted by DJ Fresh.

2010–2013: Ebb and Flow, Cloudburn, Strange Behaviour

Baxter collaborated with

Jon Gooch Jonathan Barry Gooch (born 22 August 1984 in Hertfordshire, England), more commonly known by his stage names Feed Me, Spor and seventh stitch, is a British drum and bass, dubstep and electro house producer and DJ. He is currently managed by Thr ...

(Feed Me, Spor) on numerous songs throughout this period. They released the drum & bass tracks "As I Need You" and "Overdue" as Spor and the

dubstep Dubstep is a genre of electronic dance music that originated in South London in the early 2000s. The style emerged as a UK garage offshoot that blended 2-step rhythms and sparse dub production, as well as incorporating elements of broken ...

tracks "Cloudburn", "Strange Behaviour" and "Ebb & Flow". "Cloudburn" reached number one on Beatport dubstep chart and was released on

Deadmau5 Joel Thomas Zimmerman (born January 5, 1981), known professionally as deadmau5 (pronounced "dead-mouse"), is a Canadian electronic music producer and disc jockey, DJ. His musical style mostly includes progressive house and electro house music, ...

's label

mau5trap Mau5trap (stylized as mau5trap; pronounced "mousetrap") is a Canadian independent record label founded in 2007 by electronic music producer Deadmau5. The label was formerly a vanity label, hosting releases through labels such as Ultra Music, V ...

. 'Ebb & Flow' was released on Feed Me's debut studio album ' Calamari Tuesday' and the album reached No. 14 on the UK Dance Albums Chart. 'Ebb & Flow' also appeared in the British TV show, "

Youngers ''Youngers'' is a British comedy drama series created by Benjamin Kuffuor and Levi David Addai. It began airing on E4 on 20 March 2013. It is produced by Big Talk Productions. The series has been picked up for international distribution by B ...

". In 2011, Baxter independently released her 'Ebb & Flow' EP which was produced by Jon which contained the original songs "Ebb & Flow", "Bikes" and "Fake the Fall".

2014–2019: Snowblind, Bigger than Me

In 2014, Baxter met Au5 and the song '"Snowblind" was created. Tasha wrote and performed vocals for the song and it was released on Canadian electronic record label

Monstercat Monstercat (formerly known as Monstercat Media) is a Canadian electronic music record label based in Vancouver, British Columbia. Founded in 2011 by Mike Darlington and Ari Paunonen, the label released regular compilation albums featuring music ...

. "Snowblind" reached number one on the Beatport dubstep charts and also appeared on the American TV show, "

So You Think You Can Dance ''So You Think You Can Dance'' is a franchise of reality television shows in which contestants compete in dance. The first series of the franchise, created by '' Idols'' producers Simon Fuller and Nigel Lythgoe, premiered in July 2005 and has ...

". The following year, she independently released "Bigger than Me" with Au5 as producer which has over one million streams on

Spotify Spotify (; ) is a List of companies of Sweden, Swedish Music streaming service, audio streaming and media service provider founded on 23 April 2006 by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon. , it is one of the largest providers of music streaming services ...

. In 2016, she was featured again on

with Tut Tut Child on the song "Just A Dream". In 2017 the song, "The Journey" from Baxter's album "Colour Of Me" was sampled in

Lil Wayne Dwayne Michael Carter Jr. (born September27, 1982), known professionally as Lil Wayne, is an American rapper. He is often regarded as one of the most influential hip hop artists of his generation, as well as one of the greatest rappers of all ...

's "Hittas" on his "

Tha Carter V ''Tha Carter V'' is the twelfth studio album by American rapper Lil Wayne. It was released on September 27, 2018, by Young Money Entertainment and Republic Records. The album's release date coincided with the day of Lil Wayne's 36th birthday. T ...

" studio album. During this period, Baxter continued with collaborations and recordings in the

and Drum & Bass with releases such as "Saviour" by

Flux Pavilion Joshua Kiekegaard Grant Steele (born 15 January 1989), known professionally as Flux Pavilion, is an English EDM producer, DJ, singer-songwriter and label owner. He started performing in 2008. Flux Pavilion has headlined three US tours, two UK ...

on Circus Records and "The Wall" by Abis & Signal/Imanu and with Minesweepa on "FACES" and "Stargate" with Au5 on his "Divinorum" album.

2020–present: Polyoto

In 2020, Baxter started streaming on

Twitch Twitch may refer to: Biology * Muscle contraction ** Convulsion, rapid and repeated muscle contraction and relaxation ** Fasciculation, a small, local, involuntary muscle contraction ** Myoclonic twitch, a jerk usually caused by sudden muscle c ...

during lockdown. During her streams she and her Twitch community created the collaborative album 'FULL MOON FLEX' which was released in 2021 by her record label Polyoto Records. In 2021, Baxter collaborated with Feed Me again, performing 'Reckless' on his self titled studio album 'Feed Me' released on Sotto Voce. Later in 2021, Baxter collaborated with Moore Kismet on their song 'Call of the Unicorn' released on Thrive. In 2022, Baxter collaborated with

Kill the Noise Jacob Stanczak, known professionally as Kill the Noise, is an American DJ and record producer from Rochester, New York. His collaboration with Skrillex, Fatman Scoop and Michael Angelakos, "Recess (song), Recess", entered the UK Singles Chart at ...

and

Bro Safari Nicholas Weiller, better known by his stage name Bro Safari, also known as Knick, is an American moombahton, trap, and dubstep producer. Biography Weiller was born in Rome, Italy, into a family with three brothers and one sister. The entire f ...

releasing the single "As Above So Below" via Polyoto Records. The single would also contain the "Band of Insanity" remix which was the top voted community made remix. In 2023, Baxter would collaborate again with Kill the Noise and long time collaborator Feed Me on the single "Mirage" on Kill the Noise's album "Hollow World". Later in October 2023, Baxter would return to

after 9 years releasing "Endgame" with Rebel Scum.

Discography

Studio albums

Selected singles as lead artist

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Baxter, Tasha South African pop singers South African women pop singers South African guitarists South African bass guitarists South African women guitarists South African record producers South African women record producers South African pianists South African women pianists South African drummers Women drummers Living people 1981 births South African women singer-songwriters South African singer-songwriters English-language singers from South Africa