Yoshitoshi Recordings | Label Profile

Yoshitoshi Recordings is of course the label of house music giants Deep Dish. Founded in 1994, it was labeled a progressive house label early on, although its sound carved out a much broader sound in reality, reflecting the musical tastes of its owners Dubfire and Sharam.

They are quoted as saying "I think we’ve always occupied an interesting place in dance music because we’ve never really been tied down to a specific sound or genre. We’ve tried everything, if only for the fact that we love trying new things and exploring new sounds."

Deep Dish developed offshoot dance labels Deep Dish, Shinichi and Yo as well, each catering to a slightly different genre of house music. In addition, they owned and operated a retail store (also named Yoshitoshi) in the Georgetown area of Washington D.C. The store sold an extensive selection of dance records of all genres including drum n bass and breakbeat, as well as clothing, mixtapes and record bags. The store closed in 2003, although their labels continue to release music, mostly in digital format with occasional CDs and vinyl projects.

In 2017, Yoshitoshi was voted by Mixmag readers as one of the most influential labels of the previous decade with releases from Eddie Amador, Chiapet, Kings of Tomorrow, Onur Ozman, Sharam (himself and often), David Alvarado, Lexicon Avenue, Miguel Migs, Satoshi Fume and many more.

If there is one constant regarding Yoshitoshi, it's a focus on quality rather than hype. As Sharam says, if the music is good, nothing else matters: "We don’t have an elitist mentality; music to us is emotive and faceless. I don’t care who you are and where you come from, if you can make amazing records and are willing to push the boundaries, you have a home at Yoshi."