Kidkanevil & Daisuke Tanabe - Kidsuke

Kidsuke - Kidsuke

Cover Artwork

If you are one of our more regular readers, you likely heard about the name Kidsuke by now. The project is the brainchild of Tokyo's Daisuke Tanabe and UK producer Gerard Roberts, better known as Kidkanevil, an admirer of the Japanese culture and member of the Ninja Tune affiliated Stateless. Both are also alumni of 2010's Red Bull Music Academy in London, where they met for the first time in person and where the idea for a collaboration sparked. Two years later, following many file transfers and two meetups in Tokyo and London, Berlin's Project Mooncircle has released the album.

Listening to Kidsuke takes you to your old room at your parents' house, one of the dearest places of your childhood. Through the first 10 minutes, you see yourself stepping through a hallway of memories, unfade images of your stuffed animals, happily remember melodies from that old music box. It's a sound most familiar to you, yet the melodies are unknown. There is Aphex Twin's precision, the quirkiness of Mouse on Mars, Dim Dim's playful moments, or Teebs doing his chimes. But are these really happy childhood memories, or does the music edge towards the dark and the cynic? An old nightmare of yours?, a future noir-fairytale?, some weird anime plot? It's not evidently a dark mood on the record, but it made me wonder about the musicians' intentions at times. Kidsuke has its melancholic moments, yet there are optimistic tones as in both Harmonic parts (probably my favourites, too), sweet seductivons in Frogs In A Well or Ghostboy, the uplifting MoOoOoOn. Versatile yet consistent record, an album to that you can't avoid listening on repeat. My verdict is you should buy this!01. IntroOoOoO
02. Nanotrees (Out In The Woods)
03. Frogs In A Well
04. School Chimes
05. SGstep
06. MoOoOoOn
07. Sine Flowers
08. Ghostboy
09. Tiny Concrete Block
10. The Other Day We Thought Of Our Friends…
11. Cherry Chimes
12. Ghostgirl
13. Harmonics pt. 1
14. Harmonics pt. 2
15. Super Deformed
16. The Last Train
You can get this fine record on limited orange vinyl 2-LP and several digital formats. Also available from retailers such as Bleep or iTunes, and there's the full album stream on Spotify.

Published on November 16, 2012