Felix Cartal is looking for something that’s increasingly hard to find in the algorithm-obsessed music industry: genuine, unmediated connection to his fans.
“The word ‘fan’ even sort of irks me,” he says in the music studio at the W Toronto shortly before taking the stage as part of Billboard Canada LIVE on Friday, Feb. 20. “It’s too hierarchical.”
Over 18 years in the business dating back to his early 20s, the Vancouver artist born Taelor Deitcher has achieved heights few other Canadian electronic DJs have reached, including multiple platinum singles, 800 million global streams and multiple entries on the Billboard Canadian Hot 100, including “Dancing in a Dream,” his euphoric 2025 collab with pop singer Rêve.
He’s played for huge crowds and smaller ones at his purposely intimate pop-up shows, but he sees both as part of the same project: a community of people uniting through music.
“It's fun to play for a sweaty basement of 200 people and it's fun to play on a stage for 9,000 people,” he says.
It’s more about vibes than it is about numbers.
“If the crowd is having fun then I'm having fun. If the crowd doesn't give a f— then it's the worst night of my life,” he admits.
Felix Cartal shot at the W Toronto on Feb. 20, 2026. Lane Dorsey
That mindset has followed him throughout his career, which started in North Vancouver punk bands Dysfunctional and Orange Orange. Over the last few years, he’s broken the hierarchy of the “superstar DJ” to host rogue pop-up raves and parties.
It started with beach parties — a rarity in Vancouver, which sometimes carries the name “No Fun City” for its perceived lack of venues and nightlife — which ballooned over two years from 100 people to 6,000. By the third year, the unsanctioned tradition was over before it could even start.
He’s played shows on the Vancouver SkyTrain, at the CN Tower in Toronto and in Legion Halls in smaller markets like Port Alberni, B.C.
For Cartal, the spontaneity of these events — often announced via text just hours before they begin — is a way to reclaim the "fresh" feeling of his early career. He wants people to feel like they’re part of something, rather than just observing.
His Billboard Canada LIVE show continued that search for intimacy, playing for 200 people who entered a lottery to buy tickets and answering questions submitted by his fans in an interview before the performance. He talked about why producers starting out should work without any preconceived notions, and avoid orthodox rules around genre or technology. Then, he ignited the dance floor with songs from throughout his career, along with remixes of songs by Radiohead and Basement Jaxx. Though there were high-quality visuals throughout, it felt like a house party amongst friends.
The night coincided with the release of i (still), sabotage, the deluxe version of his 2025 album i, sabotage. The album is an ode to overthinking, a way to get out of your head by getting onto the dance floor.
“I'm definitely more of a head person than a body person for sure,” he says, after hearing that description. “For me a lot of the time, music is just working through my own psychosis of self-doubt, [wondering] whether or not the song is even good.”
The centrepiece of the new deluxe tracks is “The Way,” a reimagining of the 1998 pop-rock track of the same name by Fastball. The song features fast-rising B.C. band Fionn, continuing Felix Cartal’s series of successful collaborations with Canadian pop vocalists (also including Lights, Tegan and Sara and more).
It’s a spiritual sequel to his version of New Radicals’ “You Get What You Give,” and Cartal says he’s always on the lookout for “low key hits” that he can reinterpret. He says the original chord progression of “The Way” reminded him of French electronic duo Polo & Pan, and he kept it in that “whimsical” world without leaning into the more ‘90s rock style chorus. He even sent it to Fastball, he says, and got a reply saying, “This is great. I hope it becomes a big hit.”
The idea of a hit is another thing that he is wary of, Cartal says, though he’s made many songs that meet the criteria.
“The idea of success can be kind of f–ed up, because it's [often seen as] ‘more views = better,’” he says. “I don't think that's necessarily true. Some of my favourite songs are not the artist's most popular song.”
He’s heard people at labels tell him there’s no point in making music videos, for instance, but for Cartal, the visual world is a vital part of the creative fulfillment.
“You can make that argument about everything. Then, don’t make cover art [either]. How much do you want to whittle it down? If you make a capitalist argument for everything there’s nothing left.”
Felix Cartal shot at the W Toronto on Feb. 20, 2026.Lane Dorsey
To protect that headspace, Cartal has turned to physical discipline. Before i, sabotage came out last year, Felix Cartal challenged himself to run 10 km each day for 30 days. What might be more impressive is that he did it without his phone, without headphones, without anything to distract him.
It keeps him from dwelling on numbers during release time, a point when the temptation is at its highest. He even uses an app called Brick that deactivates all his social media apps unless he physically reactivates them by tapping his phone against a magnet.
“I've realized I basically have to go to war with my phone every day to protect my ability to create,” he says.
By silencing the digital noise, Cartal is able to focus on the only metric that actually matters to him: the real-time connection between him and his audience.
"It’s a conversation,” he says. "If the crowd gives me energy, I will give it back.”
