His first official single "Harlem Shake", was released on Mad Decent subsidiary Jeffrees as a free giveaway offered via Soundcloud on May 22, 2012. It was first played by Rustie in his BBC Radio 1 essential mix before being given Pitchfork’s Best New Track Award. The rapper El-P recorded a freestyle over the track for Pitchfork TV. In the months following, online comedian George Miller and musician Joji recorded a video dancing to the song with his friends - which consequently grew into a YouTube viral video sensation as thousands of fans, artists, personalities and brands filmed their own versions to the track. Key videos were recorded by Good Morning America and The Simpsons. Thanks to a change in the Billboard chart rules in 2013, Harlem Shake became the first US number 1 produced exclusively by streaming. YouTube produced an easter egg customisation for the song, where their user interface would appear to shake at the start of the first verse. Harlem Shake is certified double platinum in the United States. At the time of releasing his debut album Aa in 2016, Baauer, Adele and Drake held the record for top streams achieved in a week. Harlem Shake won Dance Song of the Year and EDM Song of the Year at the 2013 Billboard Music Awards..
First EPs
In August 2012 Baauer signed to the LuckyMe record label and released his debut EP Dum Dum, and in 2014 the follow up EP ß..
''Aa''
Baauer released his debut album, Aa via LuckyMe on March 18, 2016. It has guest features by Future, G-Dragon, Leikeli47, M.I.A., Novelist, Pusha T, Rustie, Tirzah and TT the Artist. The album was announced by Stephen Colbert on The Late Show on January 27, 2016; Baauer’s performance subverted the format of conventional late night TV performances as he sat on the guest sofa and pressed spacebar on his laptop to queue the live performance of rapper Leikeli47. LuckyMe partnered with Apple Music to create and distribute music videos for Aa by the director and co-creator of Atlanta, Hiro Murai.
2016
In addition to his debut album in 2016 Baauer also scored a catwalk show for Alexander Wang and played parties for the fashion designer in New York alongside G-Dragon of the K-Pop act Big Bang. He also featured as a model in the "Wangang" campaign. Also in 2016, Baauer’s track "Horns" soundtracked Budweiser’s Superbowl campaign.
2018
In 2018, he released four standalone singles, "3AM" featuring AJ Tracey & Jae Stephens on July 12. Followed by "Hate Me", featuring virtual influencer Lil Miquela on August 17. Baauer appeared on Spotify’s Times Square Billboard in promotion of the track. This was followed on October 23 by "Company" featuring Soleima, which premiered with Zane Lowe on Apple Music. The video by Jonathan Zawada premiered with Pitchfork. Baauer then released "Tep Tep" on December 13 as part of the LuckyMe advent calendar series. Also in 2018, Baauer composed the music for the second season of the Marvel/Netflix series Iron Fist.
2019
In 2019 he featured on two songs on Rico Nasty’s Anger Management Mixtape, alongside the Atlanta hip hop duo Earth Gang. The tracks were co-produced by Kenny Beats. Baauer’s music was also featured in numerous campaigns and video games this year, including FIFA 20 and with an original song for alongside Danny Brown and Channel Tres. Baauer’s track 'GoGo!' was used to trail 'The League of Legends Euro-Finals'. And his track “3AM”, was featured as theme music on KSI’s YouTube.
''Planet's Mad''
In 2020 Baauer announced his second album Planet's Mad for release on June 5, 2020, via LuckyMe. It later got delayed to June 19, 2020. He announced the title track as the first single with an animated video directed by Actual Objects Studio, receiving a Vimeo Staff Pick. "Planet's Mad" was also used in a Vauxhall car commercial.
