in 1989, after dropping out of berklee, bt moved to los angeles, where he tried, unsuccessfully, to get signed as a singer-songwriter. realizing he should focus on the electronic music he was more passionate about, he moved back to maryland in 1990 and began collaborating with friends ali "dubfire" shirazinia and sharam tayebi of deep dish. together they started deep dish records. early in his career, bt worked under a variety of musical aliases, including prana, elastic chakra, elastic reality, libra, dharma, kaistar and gtb.