How exactly an electronic live act should work is still an open question. There is no conventional setup or approach—it's down to the artist to define his or her own method. In a way, this explains why Lorenz Brunner, the artist better known as Recondite, does so well at it. A former personal trainer with a deeply pragmatic mind , Brunner attacks such challenges with the relish of a life-hacker. It's therefore unsurprising that Recondite's live act should be so elegantly optimized. Using a laptop, a controller and parts to hundreds of his tracks, Brunner nimbly improvises with loops, reacting to the club and the crowd in much the way a DJ would. This keeps his sets fresh and dynamic, while the material itself, sleek and dramatic as it is, lends them an ineffable sense of depth. The end result is often spellbinding—and undoubtedly deserving of the top spot.