Raised in Santa Cruz, California, Andy Caldwell rose to prominence in the late 1990s, playing and producing records that sounded almost like Chicago house tracks, but with half the aggression and twice the sunshine. This style was eventually codified by San Francisco–based labels Om and Naked Music, both of which branded their music as a kind of lifestyle accessory for the young and upwardly mobile.

Caldwell benefited greatly from this association, becoming an in-demand touring DJ and releasing a string of 12-inch hits—a few of which were licensed for use in television programs like Six Feet Under and Boston Public. Although he’s proud of these achievements, the producer admits he’s not altogether satisfied with his reputation: whatever he is, Caldwell insists he is not—or not simply—a West Coast house DJ.

“I’ve been struggling with that association for quite a few years now,” he says, on the line from his Los Angeles home. “When I do my DJ sets or my remixes, everyone expects the type of deep house you’d hear on a Hed Kandi or Naked Music compilation, and that’s just not what I do anymore, and it hasn’t been for a long time. I’ve just let go of it, because for a while it was really bothering me. Now I don’t care; I just do my own thing.”

That thing is a pastiche of sorts that combines house music’s steady pulse with electro’s synthetic textures and the streetwise swagger of contemporary R & B. The prototype for Caldwell’s new direction is “Warrior”, a single from his first full-length, 2006’s Universal Truth. Where most of the producer’s other tracks feature traditional acoustic instrumentation, “Warrior” achieves an airy feel from entirely digital sources, particularly its interlocking synthesizer lines, which form the track’s harmonic and percussive foundation. The song’s vocal, meanwhile, is done by Lisa Shaw, the American scene’s subtlest diva and the ideal accompanist to Caldwell’s newfound essentialism.

“Previous to that track, everything I had done with vocal arrangements was really complex—stacked harmonies and lots of different vocal tricks,” he explains. “ ‘Warrior’ broke me out of that style. Now I’m interested in something more stripped-down, where the vocal arrangements aren’t so intricate. It’s just a looser vocal style, and the backing is more electronic, a little sharper sounding than some of my older material.”

Even as his productions grow more electronic, says Caldwell, they are still a product of his experiments at the piano. In a domain where nearly every young producer composes tracks on the computer, that makes the 35-year-old something of a throwback. No matter how Caldwell’s music is characterized—as West Coast, progressive, or otherwise—it bears a mark that’s little seen in these days of ProTooled perfectionism: its maker’s fingerprints.

Andy Caldwell plays Ginger 62 on Saturday (February 2).