Radio Slave’s Rekids sublabel RSPX welcomes back Ken Ishii to the label with three tracks of uplifting and effortless techno mastery written in his own signature style.
Ken Ishii is a legend in the techno sphere, going way back to the days where he was viewed as something of a prodigy in the world of techno music. His treatise on modulation with the album Jellytones is an absolute masterpiece. He’s never stopped making techno, with 2 EPs a year, but more or less he has diversified his interests in soundtracks and video games.
When he’s called back to release an EP, such as on Tronic’s “Giant Killer” EP, it’s always of high quality and tells of a style of synthesis and sound design that has clarity of signal at the forefront of his sonics. This may have initially started with the “Future in Light” and the “Sunriser” albums, but there’s a playful characteristic that has emerged as a running theme in his music.
This is something that was highlighted by the Ken Ishii vs FLR collaboration “Space Invaders,” where Ishii’s pseudonym FLR, or Flare, came to bring this idea of a joyful, poppy nature to techno.
Some of these ideas can be heard on the “Autopilot” single, as well as some of the FLR ideas of keeping things simple and fun. The title track would certainly fall into these characteristics. The resonant baseline, free from excessive saturation or any grim tones, is offset from the kick/bass groove in a very funky and animated way. The whole track is supremely infectious, sophisticated, and just rolls off Ishii’s imagination and into his laptop with ease and a complete sense of mastery of the art.
“Sunset Flight” also sets the tone and pace of keeping things light and bouncy with a known shaker break (redacted for the underground) for his groove foundation, and it sets up gliding Detroit-styled chords that are underscored by a matched octave baseline. Just a simple and effective track to carry the dance floor and light it up with imagined peachy and yellow hues.
“Grid Bounce” takes things into a frenetic stroboscopic place that still has the fun aspects of “Space Invaders” concepts but also some of the harder aspects, as in the signature FLR strobing techno that really drives into your skull. It goes from solid and slamming to wilding out in under a minute. Guaranteed, if you’re just listening to this casually, someone in the other room will be asking, “What are you listening to?!” This is the kind of track you may look at putting on when you’re behind the decks at 4 a.m. and the crowd is on their second biscuit with sunglasses on. ‘It’s already messy. Let’s kick it up a notch.’
Respect to Rekids and Ken Ishii for a top release. The artist has stuck to his original ideas and leads the pack with talent and a well-defined, danceable groove on this release. What follows is a statement about great dance music that is fun to dance to and technical mastery that is just as satisfying to listen to.
-Sean Ocean
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