Houses & Mute Choir

Houses' Dexter Tortoriello and Megan Messina hail from Chicago, but the roots of their dreamy electro-pop can be traced back to a potent three-month stay in Hawaii. Tortoriello played in metal and noise bands during his teens in suburban Illinois, and to Columbia College. He eventually left college and moved to California, then Salt Lake City. Around this time, he began a solo project called Hospital Tapes. Tortoriello returned to Illinois in 2009 and got a job at a local Apple store, where he met Messina, one of his coworkers. The pair struck up a relationship quickly and mov...