How Tim Green’s Origins in Rock Shaped His Style of House Music

British producer Tim Green is known for his atmospheric, fluid style of progressive house, which draws from a variety of inspirations throughout his musical career. His lush compositions are full of depth, which comes from his lifelong background as an instrumentalist.

Tim Green found his love of music at an early age. His father had a “huge music collection,” along with a “huge studio; a collection of synths, tape machines, and mixers; and great HiFi systems and like a Hammond Organ as well,” he told Gray Area during his Spotlight interview.

“I was just surrounded by all of it,” he said. “I was able to play around with the equipment and was subconsciously fed all of this great music my dad was listening to.”

Tim Green (right) playing the guitar as a child.

As a child, Tim started following in his father’s footsteps as a musician early on, initially taking to the guitar. He says he “dove headfirst” into playing the instrument. “I think I didn't have any choice but to do music. I grew up with it—it made sense to me,” he explains.

A young Tim Green would find himself playing in a variety of bands. He started with “Van Halen, ‘80s stadium rock stuff, which is ridiculous considering I was a kid living in the South of England, but that's just what I grew up loving.” This progressed to an appreciation of darker, heavier styles from grunge bands like “Nirvana, Rage Against the Machine, and Deftones; that grungy sort of side of metal as well.”

The music began to shape a path for the budding artist. “When I was younger, I wanted to make a living out of being a guitar player and as a session player or as an artist,” he says. “That was my early dream. I never thought it was possible.” Tim Green diverted from his course as a guitarist, however, as he shares he “never tried to pursue it because dance music eventually got into my life and kind of took over.”

Green’s path changed when he heard legendary French duo Daft Punk for the first time while studying at university. “They were sampling records that I knew, because I knew the originals,” he says. “I was hearing this music that I grew up with in a new light; it wasn't something that was necessarily used to. It was all about technology, which is very forward thinking; almost the opposite of guitars and instruments. It was quite futuristic [and] it just felt really fresh to me.”

This led him to begin making singles like “Little Flies” and “Rhythm Acupuncture,” two early experiments that helped the producer “learn about sequencers and how to program drums, and everything else.” He recalls that he was “at the beginning of my journey of learning how to fuse the music that I grew up with into this new sound that I'm trying to explore.”

Regardless of what kind of music he is making, whether it’s rock, techno, or progressive house, Tim Green is always looking to try new techniques in his creative output. Keeping things interesting is “fun, it's exciting,” he says. “It just creates a different path.”