AHADADREAM brings his distinctive take on global club music to Australia this November, with shows in Sydney, Perth, Melbourne and Strawberry Fields. The British-Pakistani DJ and producer arrives following the release of his debut album, P ★ K I, a record that traces the connections between his South Asian heritage and the sounds of the UK underground.

Ahad Elley’s music is built around the movement of rhythms across borders. South Asian percussion, UK funky, grime, gqom and drum’n’bass all find their way into his productions and DJ sets, held together by a deep understanding of what makes a dancefloor move. His sound draws on the music he grew up around in Pakistan and the London club culture that shaped him, without treating either as a boundary.

That relationship between heritage and club music comes into focus on P ★ K I. Drawing on Punjabi folk, South Asian classical instrumentation and devotional music including qawwali, the album brings these influences into conversation with contemporary bass music. From the orchestral fragments and rolling low end of ‘Tere Bin’ to the grime-heavy ‘Put That Banger On Next’ with Capo Lee, it’s a portrait of an artist finding new possibilities in the sounds that have followed him throughout his life.

His 2023 collaboration with Skrillex and Priya Ragu, ‘TAKA’, brought this approach to a wider audience, reaching #3 on the UK Official Asian Music Chart and earning BBC Radio 1’s Hottest Record and Essential New Tune. More recently, ‘Bass Dhol’, his reunion with Skrillex alongside Raf-Saperra, became the first release on the new Dialled In imprint via Island Records, reaching #1 on the Official British Asian Music Chart.

Beyond his own productions, Ahad has spent years building the infrastructure for other artists to be heard. Through More Time, the label he co-founded with Sam Interface, and Dialled In, the festival and creative platform he co-founded in 2021, he has helped connect South Asian artists and diasporic sounds with audiences far beyond their immediate scenes. The work is part of a wider commitment to making club culture a place where people can hear themselves represented, while pushing its sound somewhere new.

This November, AHADADREAM brings that expansive musical vision to Australian dancefloors.

‍