# Dan Snaith
**Dan Snaith** (born 1978) is a Canadian musician, composer, and producer who records electronic and dance music under the names Caribou and Daphni, and formerly Manitoba. He holds a doctorate in mathematics from [Imperial College London](https://www.edgepedia.org/imperial-college-london), completed in 2005, and has released a sequence of albums that moved from sample-based electronica through psychedelic pop to club-oriented house music.[1](https://codamusic.me/articles/caribou-floating-points-2024-albums) • [2](https://www.universalmusic.fr/artistes/30067730978)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Born | 1978, Dundas, Ontario, Canada, to parents who were both mathematics professors[2](https://www.universalmusic.fr/artistes/30067730978) |
| Education | Master's in pure mathematics; PhD in mathematics, Imperial College London, completed 2005[3](https://exclaim.ca/music/article/manitoba-melody_maker) • [1](https://codamusic.me/articles/caribou-floating-points-2024-albums) |
| Aliases | Manitoba (early 2000s), Caribou (from 2004), Daphni (club-focused alias, first release 2011)[4](https://www.allmusic.com/artist/caribou-mn0000609590) • [5](https://www.meritandwave.com/caribou) |
| Notable albums | Start Breaking My Heart (2001), Up in Flames (2003), Andorra (2007), Swim (2010), Our Love (2014), Suddenly (2020), Honey (2024)[4](https://www.allmusic.com/artist/caribou-mn0000609590) • [6](https://newsroom.spotify.com/2019-12-11/caribous-dan-snaith-on-new-music-discovery-and-spotifys-altar-playlist/) |
| Awards | Polaris Music Prize 2008 for Andorra[4](https://www.allmusic.com/artist/caribou-mn0000609590) |
| Working method | Early records made alone in an apartment bedroom with a computer, a cheap sampler, and a handful of instruments; Daphni tracks written in a single day on a modular synthesizer[7](https://xlr8r.com/features/caribou-in-the-studio/) • [8](https://thequietus.com/interviews/daphni-caribou-interview-dan-snaith-caribou-jiaolong/) |
## Early life and education
Snaith grew up in Dundas, a small town in Ontario, Canada, and studied piano from the age of five, adding classical and jazz training to a listening diet of progressive and psychedelic rock, 1960s pop, and later hip-hop and electronic music.[3](https://exclaim.ca/music/article/manitoba-melody_maker) He was born in 1978 to parents who both taught mathematics.[2](https://www.universalmusic.fr/artistes/30067730978)
His academic path ran alongside his music. He completed a Master's in pure mathematics, and finished a PhD in mathematics at Imperial College London in 2005, the same year he released his first album as Caribou.[3](https://exclaim.ca/music/article/manitoba-melody_maker) • [1](https://codamusic.me/articles/caribou-floating-points-2024-albums) Snaith has rejected the idea that the two pursuits are opposites, saying that the qualities he loved in mathematics, unpredictability and spontaneity, are the same ones he pursues in music.[9](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/entertainment/2010/05/07/a-mind-for-music-and-math/d7448699-8cbd-4d16-9aeb-76340dd7f35a/)
## Manitoba and the name change
Snaith's first release was the EP *People Eating Fruit*, issued under the name Manitoba in 2000.[10](https://dmy.co/features/caribou-interview-i-always-feel-like-i-am-fumbling-around) Two full-length albums followed: *Start Breaking My Heart* (2001), described as glitchy yet organic, and *Up in Flames* (2003), which drew on shoegaze influences and won critical acclaim.[4](https://www.allmusic.com/artist/caribou-mn0000609590) These early records blended electronic sampling with influences from progressive and psychedelic rock.[11](https://www.worldradiohistory.com/Archive-All-Music/Electronic-Musician/2020/Electronic-Musician-2020-04.pdf)
The Manitoba name ended in a legal dispute. Handsome Dick Manitoba, the punk singer of the Dictators, threatened Snaith with a lawsuit over the name, and Snaith changed the project's name to Caribou in 2004. *The Milk of Human Kindness* became the first official Caribou release, and Snaith re-released much of his Manitoba material under the new name.[4](https://www.allmusic.com/artist/caribou-mn0000609590) • [12](https://www.worldradiohistory.com/UK/New-Musical-Express/2014/NME-2014-09-27.pdf)
## The Caribou albums
Snaith settled in London in the early 2000s, and his musical output developed substantially there.[11](https://www.worldradiohistory.com/Archive-All-Music/Electronic-Musician/2020/Electronic-Musician-2020-04.pdf) His early recordings were minimalist electronic compositions, and with each successive album he expanded his sound.[9](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/entertainment/2010/05/07/a-mind-for-music-and-math/d7448699-8cbd-4d16-9aeb-76340dd7f35a/) *Andorra* (2007), released on Merge, was a lush, psychedelic record with [Brian Wilson](https://www.edgepedia.org/brian-wilson) as a common reference point; it won Canada's 2008 Polaris Music Prize.[4](https://www.allmusic.com/artist/caribou-mn0000609590) • [9](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/entertainment/2010/05/07/a-mind-for-music-and-math/d7448699-8cbd-4d16-9aeb-76340dd7f35a/)
A turning point came after Snaith watched the Detroit DJ Theo Parrish perform live, which spurred his move toward house and techno.[12](https://www.worldradiohistory.com/UK/New-Musical-Express/2014/NME-2014-09-27.pdf) *Swim* (2010) foregrounded beats and club rhythms while keeping the psychedelic pop elements of his earlier work, and is widely treated as his breakthrough record.[4](https://www.allmusic.com/artist/caribou-mn0000609590) • [11](https://www.worldradiohistory.com/Archive-All-Music/Electronic-Musician/2020/Electronic-Musician-2020-04.pdf) *Our Love* (2014) continued in a minimalist, danceable direction.[2](https://www.universalmusic.fr/artistes/30067730978) After a gap of more than five years, *Suddenly* arrived in February 2020, preceded by the singles "Home" and "You and I"; Snaith described gathering song fragments over years, making four or five 30-second loops in a studio session and combining them slowly into finished songs.[6](https://newsroom.spotify.com/2019-12-11/caribous-dan-snaith-on-new-music-discovery-and-spotifys-altar-playlist/)
## Daphni
Under the alias Daphni, Snaith releases club-focused dance music, a deliberate contrast with Caribou's more all-encompassing songs. He has said that Daphni is specifically about making music for the club, while Caribou tracks explore harmony and lyrics.[6](https://newsroom.spotify.com/2019-12-11/caribous-dan-snaith-on-new-music-discovery-and-spotifys-altar-playlist/) The first release under the name was a split single with [Four Tet](https://www.edgepedia.org/four-tet), *Pinnacles/Ye Ye*, issued on Kieran Hebden's Text imprint in 2011; the two have shared bills and DJ sets regularly since.[5](https://www.meritandwave.com/caribou)
The two projects also differ in method. Each track on the Daphni album was made in a single day, usually a Friday or Saturday afternoon before an evening DJ set, on a modular synthesizer whose physical knobs made the work fast and tactile. Caribou tracks, by contrast, are ones Snaith says he agonizes over, revisiting harmony and structure repeatedly.[8](https://thequietus.com/interviews/daphni-caribou-interview-dan-snaith-caribou-jiaolong/) He has described using Daphni to clear out leftover musical ideas before focusing on the next Caribou record.[13](https://www.musicradar.com/artists/each-of-our-albums-had-a-synth-that-really-excited-us-the-first-was-a-prophet-08-the-second-was-the-ms-20-and-this-time-the-moog-matriarch-is-on-every-track-maribou-state-on-hallucinating-love)
## Live performance
Caribou's live show has evolved from a solo studio project into a four-piece band that translates Snaith's studio productions into large-scale performances, with appearances at festivals including [Glastonbury](https://www.edgepedia.org/glastonbury), Coachella, and [Primavera Sound](https://www.edgepedia.org/primavera-sound).[14](https://www.synergyconcerts.com/events/2026-07-17-caribou-plus-ahadadream-plus-tatyana-plus-andrew-thomson-swg3-the-yard) Snaith thinks of the live show and the albums as two different entities, and with *Swim* he divided his material between Caribou songs and his own DJ sets.[15](https://www.electronicbeats.net/more-madness-than-method-dan-snaith-on-the-poetics-of-a-blank-slate) Despite the scale of the recorded arrangements, he made his early albums alone in an apartment bedroom with a computer, a cheap sampler, and a handful of instruments, and had never worked in a professional studio as of the *Andorra* era.[7](https://xlr8r.com/features/caribou-in-the-studio/)
## Honey and recent work
*Honey*, released on 4 October 2024 on Merge Records, blurred the line between the two aliases more than any previous record, moving between Caribou's melodic style and Daphni's heavier club tempos.[16](https://djmag.com/reviews/caribou-honey) A advance single titled "Honey" had appeared in April 2024 on Merge, sounding closer to Daphni than to Snaith's usual Caribou material.[17](https://ra.co/reviews/36033) On the album, Snaith processed his own vocals with AI tools so that they resemble anonymous guest singers or sampled voices; all the vocals are his, but the treatment makes them read like samples rather than lead singing.[18](https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/caribou-honey/) Reviewers described the record as a pivot toward direct dancefloor pop, with Snaith singing every note live in support of the album.[19](https://www.theguardian.com/music/article/2024/sep/09/caribou-review-the-waiting-room-honey-dan-snaith)
## References
1. [Caribou and Floating Points, Two Scientists Who Build for the Body, Coda Music](https://codamusic.me/articles/caribou-floating-points-2024-albums)
2. [Caribou, Universal Music France](https://www.universalmusic.fr/artistes/30067730978)
3. [Manitoba, Exclaim!](https://exclaim.ca/music/article/manitoba-melody_maker)
4. [Caribou, Biography and Discography, AllMusic](https://www.allmusic.com/artist/caribou-mn0000609590)
5. [Caribou Booking, Merit and Wave](https://www.meritandwave.com/caribou)
6. [Caribou's Dan Snaith on New Music, Discovery, and Spotify's Altar Playlist, Spotify Newsroom](https://newsroom.spotify.com/2019-12-11/caribous-dan-snaith-on-new-music-discovery-and-spotifys-altar-playlist/)
7. [Caribou In the Studio, XLR8R](https://xlr8r.com/features/caribou-in-the-studio/)
8. [Modular Love: Daphni & Caribou's Dan Snaith Interviewed, The Quietus](https://thequietus.com/interviews/daphni-caribou-interview-dan-snaith-caribou-jiaolong/)
9. [A Mind for Music and Math, The Washington Post](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/entertainment/2010/05/07/a-mind-for-music-and-math/d7448699-8cbd-4d16-9aeb-76340dd7f35a/)
10. [Caribou Interview, DMY](https://dmy.co/features/caribou-interview-i-always-feel-like-i-am-fumbling-around)
11. [Electronic Musician, April 2020 issue](https://www.worldradiohistory.com/Archive-All-Music/Electronic-Musician/2020/Electronic-Musician-2020-04.pdf)
12. [NME, 27 September 2014 issue](https://www.worldradiohistory.com/UK/New-Musical-Express/2014/NME-2014-09-27.pdf)
13. [Maribou State on Hallucinating Love, MusicRadar](https://www.musicradar.com/artists/each-of-our-albums-had-a-synth-that-really-excited-us-the-first-was-a-prophet-08-the-second-was-the-ms-20-and-this-time-the-moog-matriarch-is-on-every-track-maribou-state-on-hallucinating-love)
14. [Caribou at SWG3 The Yard, Glasgow, Synergy Concerts](https://www.synergyconcerts.com/events/2026-07-17-caribou-plus-ahadadream-plus-tatyana-plus-andrew-thomson-swg3-the-yard)
15. [More Madness Than Method: Dan Snaith on the Poetics of a Blank Slate, Telekom Electronic Beats](https://www.electronicbeats.net/more-madness-than-method-dan-snaith-on-the-poetics-of-a-blank-slate)
16. [Caribou, Honey, DJ Mag review](https://djmag.com/reviews/caribou-honey)
17. [Caribou, Honey single review, Resident Advisor](https://ra.co/reviews/36033)
18. [Caribou: Honey Album Review, Pitchfork](https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/caribou-honey/)
19. [Caribou Review, The Guardian](https://www.theguardian.com/music/article/2024/sep/09/caribou-review-the-waiting-room-honey-dan-snaith)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Music › Music scenes › Transnational genre scenes › Electronic dance music (EDM) and rave culture › Artists, groups, and people: Electronic dance music (EDM) and rave culture › IDM, ambient, and downtempo artists*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Sep 30, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Sep 30, 2026; Oct 12, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license