Elephante's Tim Wu thought he had his career path all laid out for him. He went to Harvard, majored in economics, and got a cushy corporate job. The whole time, though, something was eating at him.

The Ann Arbor native, born in 1989, had grown up playing classical piano and eventually started making music on Fruity Loops. As he settled into life in a suit, he realized the creative side of him was going unfulfilled.

The elephant in the room was unmistakable: He'd rather be making music. So he did what most people in his position would only dream of doing. He quit his job, moved to Los Angeles, and dedicated himself to music. His alias pays tribute to that aspirational pachyderm that convinced him to take the plunge.

At first, Wu set out to be a singer/songwriter. However, realizing how crowded that field was, he quickly changed course and capitalized on his knowledge of music software, MIDI, and MPCs. Hearing RL Grime and Baauer at Hard Fest in 2014 inspired him to begin incorporating trap elements into his big-room productions.

After self-releasing his first singles, in 2015 he put out his official debut on Armada, the global EDM powerhouse. In 2016, he announced his definitive arrival with his I Am the Elephante EP, an irresistible fusion of top-shelf EDM and platinum-plated pop hooks. The same year, his single "Age of Innocence" went all the way to No. 18 on the Billboard Dance/Club chart.

In 2018, he expanded his sound with the Glass Mansion EP, which quickly went to No.1 on the iTunes U.S. Dance chart. It folded acoustic guitars and chill-trap beats into tunes geared not just to festival main stages, but also pre-game barbecues and late-night hang sessions.

Live, Elephante is known for playing all the unofficial remixes you won't hear on streaming services — silky, silvery reworks of tunes by artists like Clean Bandit, Galantis, and Calvin Harris — as he takes listeners on a thrill ride of immersive visuals, cavernous bass drops, and even call-and-response crowd sing-alongs.