De Kraken, Willem van Rij’s creative alias, started around 2016. With his dad singing in a classic choir and his mom just a good dancer he had not a big musical family, but enough influence to gain his interest for music. As a young teenager he puts himself to sleep every night with The Doors' Riders On The Storm. When he grew older the love for vinyl and electronic music took over. His first steps in producing music were inspired by his house music roots. He earned himself a couple of releases, but a period of being thrown back to the most fundamental aspects of life made him move to another corner of the musical spectrum. Two years of combining dreamy soundscapes, autobiographic stories and heavy basslines he found himself in a place he could truly satisfy himself. Turning his deepest feelings in to music. The music evolved from rave into deep emotive and cinematic panorama's. A fuse of danceable genres somewhere in between indie and edgy-electronics. In 2019 the result of roaming around in this dark place was the birth of his debut album 'Two Crosses'. In the 20's he keeps develloping his voice and his sound inspired by artists like Moderat, Overmono and Aparat, releasing new work like 'Innocence' 'Frida' and 'Green Window Red Dots'. He earned himself live shows at Dutch national radio 3FM and supported the American duo 'Beacon' at Patronaat Haarlem. In 2022 De Kraken won the audience award of 'De Grote Prijs van Rotterdam 2022' in the producers category.