Above & Beyond — Biography, Anjunabeats Empire & Iconic Tracks

Jono Grant, Tony McGuinness, and Paavo Salminen — collectively Above & Beyond — met in London's recording studios in the late 1990s. All three brought different skills and sensibilities: Grant's production background, McGuinness's industry experience, and Salminen's classical music training. Their combination proved remarkably synergistic. The trio founded Anjunabeats in 2000 as a vehicle for their own music and quickly discovered a talent for building a label that felt less like a business and more like a community gathering point.

Their musical approach distinguished them from the start. Where much trance of the early 2000s prioritised energy and momentum, Above & Beyond emphasised melody, emotion, and a kind of introspective quality that their audience found deeply resonant. Songs like "Can't Sleep," "Good For Me," and "No One On Earth" sounded like the interior experience of falling in love or losing something precious — they were trance tracks that felt like diary entries.

The Anjuna family of labels grew organically from the founders' tastes. Anjunabeats, the original imprint, covers trance, progressive house, and melodic electronic music with an emphasis on emotional depth and production sophistication. Its roster has included Seven Lions, Audien, Grum, Andrew Bayer, Mat Zo, and dozens of other artists who share a commitment to substance over trend.

Anjunadeep, launched in 2005, occupies the deeper, more introspective end of the electronic music spectrum — slower tempos, more hypnotic grooves, music built for late nights in intimate venues rather than festival main stages. It has become as celebrated as its parent label, developing its own distinct community and aesthetic identity. The two labels together represent one of the most coherent brand visions in electronic music: music that takes emotional intelligence seriously.

Above & Beyond's Group Therapy Radio — launched in 2012 as the successor to their original Trance Around the World programme — performs for their community the same function that A State of Trance performs for Armin's. Each episode features new music from the Anjuna family and beyond, artist guest mixes, and the "Social" segment where listeners share personal messages about how the music has affected their lives. The willingness to include listener voices in the broadcast — to treat the audience as genuine participants rather than passive consumers — has created a bond between the Above & Beyond community and the label that is extraordinarily deep.

Group Therapy Live events — particularly the outdoor show at the Gorge Amphitheatre in Washington State and the annual Group Therapy 450/500 milestone shows — have become legendary gatherings. The atmosphere at these events is notably different from typical rave or festival culture: warmer, more inclusive, more explicitly focused on the shared experience of music as an emotional language.

Above & Beyond's own production has evolved significantly across their career. Their debut album "Tri-State" (2006) established their melodic trance credentials. "Group Therapy" (2011) expanded their sonic palette and featured collaborators including Richard Bedford, whose vocal contributions became integral to the Anjuna sound. "We Are All We Need" (2015) showed a more pop-influenced approach. "Flow State" (2019) was an ambient, meditative departure — an album designed for focused listening rather than dancefloor consumption — that demonstrated the depth of their artistic ambition.

Their live show — Above & Beyond Group Therapy Live — combines DJ performance with live elements, projections, and a stage design that creates an immersive environment. The show has played in venues ranging from Madison Square Garden to intimate club spaces, consistently maintaining an emotional quality that transcends the venue size.

What Above & Beyond and the Anjuna labels have built is something that most music businesses aspire to but rarely achieve: a genuine community of people who feel that the music speaks to them personally, who share that feeling with strangers at events, and who return year after year because the emotional connection remains real. Artists signed to Anjuna routinely cite the label's community-first philosophy as a defining factor in their careers.

In a music industry often characterised by short attention spans and trend-chasing, the Anjuna empire has demonstrated that there is a large and loyal audience for music that takes emotional depth seriously. That lesson — that authenticity and community build something more durable than any individual hit — is perhaps the most important thing Above & Beyond has contributed to electronic music culture.