data transmission turns 18

Today, data transmission turns 18 years old, which feels mad to write.

It’s old enough to go to a rave, have a drink, and stand at the back of the room pretending it still enjoys the dancefloor. Which is funny, because I don’t drink anymore. Thirteen months sober. Didn’t plan that sentence, but here we are.

When dt started, none of this was part of the plan. At its heart, it has always been about digging for new music and artists, finding the music we love, including genres that maybe others don’t, and supporting them just because. Supporting artists when they’re on the third or fourth room of a flyer, writing about them early, and then continuing to write about them years later as they grow.

It’s been 18 years of being an authority on dance music across whatever genres we’ve been into at the time, whether they were popular or not. More importantly, it’s been 18 years of watching artists’ journeys closely, understanding the blueprints behind them, and learning how the landscape shifts around them.

When dt launched in 2008, blogs were the main way to find new music, before social media, before live streams, before AI, and right at the beginning of streaming as we know it. People were arguing about CDs versus vinyl, like it actually mattered. Some things never change. A guy put on a mouse helmet and had one of the biggest tracks of the year. I remember that, do you? Around the same time, Eric Prydz released Pjanoo, which I’m still not sure is an instrument or something you put on before going to bed.

But let’s not look back for too long. data transmission has always been about what’s next. The new music. The new sound. Who you need to know about that’s breaking, or even better, before they’ve broken. That’s always been the instinct. To keep looking forward. To keep asking what’s coming, not what already happened.

When someone asks, “Who’s your favourite artist?” or “What’s your favourite track?”, the answer is never something already played to death. It’s always the one you haven’t heard yet, but need to. The one that hasn’t landed properly. The one that’s still forming. That curiosity is the real constant. Not the platforms. Not the formats. Not the trends. Just the urge to stay one step ahead of the moment, without ever losing the love for the music itself.

dt just kept going and kept finding new music first. Somewhere along the way, it became more than a blog or what we always thought of as an online magazine.

In 2010, we started premiering music on what was then a small SoundCloud account. That slowly grew into seven accounts, with over 350,000 followers and hundreds of millions of plays. We genuinely love SoundCloud at data transmission, including all the times when it’s not quite working, and especially when it comes back again. We still premiere four to five tracks a day for record labels and music producers, and over time, those channels also became the home for our own record labels across disco, house, tech house, deep tech on 63b, and DT DNB.

As the landscape changed, dt evolved too, sometimes behind the curve and sometimes learning slower than we should have. But you learn, you catch up, you work out why things shifted, and then you evolve again. Over the years, DT has helped build the scene in our hometown of Milton Keynes and has also shaped the landscape of artists and digital media online.

In 2014, our love for radio and a deep love for the DJ mix pulled us in another direction, and we launched Data Transmission Radio. It started humbly, like everything else, as an idea to run a regular radio show, first with Eagle & Butterflies and then with Bontan at the helm. Today, it’s a fully fledged radio station with nearly 190 show hosts every month, each bringing their own guests, sounds, and communities into data transmission. For 2026, we’ve given it a full facelift and packed it with new features.

Over the last five years, our demo feedback sessions on YouTube have helped thousands of tracks and multiple albums get signed after we listened to over 10,000 demos in our two-hour live sessions. Alongside that, we’ve built a Discord community of aspiring music producers and DJs, which is honestly one of the best things we’ve ever built.

Now, in year 18, we’re returning to club land with an event series to support our artists, record labels, and radio presenters.

None of this exists without people. Not just artists, but the people who kept turning up behind the scenes when it wasn’t glamorous, when it was repetitive, and when it was just work. Shelley has been part of dt for over ten years now, which in itself feels wild. Hobbs. Loz. Carlos. Mum. And everyone who’s been part of the DT team over the years, whether for a season or for the long haul. This thing only works because people care enough to keep it moving.

And then there’s the audience. The readers. The listeners. The artists. The DJs. The producers. The people who sent demos, tuned into radio shows, showed up at events, or just quietly followed along. If data transmission has supported you, helped you, shared your music, or played even a small part in your journey at any point over the last 18 years, that matters more than any numbers ever could.

That’s the part that doesn’t show up in stats. But it’s the reason dt still exists.

Eighteen years isn’t a flex. It’s just proof that turning up quietly for a long time still counts for something.