Boards
Sonic Router: Interview & Mix w/ Chairman Kato [Pictures Music]
http://www.sonicrouter.com/2011/02/interview-chariman-kato-pictures-music.html
For all our love of bastard house and the overloaded synth explosions of the current instrumental hip hop and skweee that we harp on about endlessly, it ain’t half clean sounding. OK admittedly, someone like Egyptrixx - whose just announced his debut album Bible Eyes will be released on Night Slugs in early March - uses a little more of that sheet noise aesthetic, trusting a lot of his stylistics to the overbearing presence inherent in his sound, but sometimes our ears just hanker for that completely immersive, brooding, drum kit falling down the stairs type of beat music. Plus, as Slugabed so eloquently pointed out recently, there’s not been so much of the slow, slow stuff round these parts recently.
Enter then Chairman Kato, a London dweller whose productions simultaneously imbibe the foreboding spirit of early El-P (think The Cold Vein more than Fantastic Damage) and Shackleton’s passion for drawn out drones as melodies. Texturally, it’s often hard to beat the crunch and depth in sound that you get from using analogue equipment, and Kato’s forthcoming EP for Pictures Music , the Wildfire EP, displays precisely what we mean by that sweeping statement. 5 tracks strong it revels in its own darkness, perfectly creating a darkened and lonely person’s dream state. ‘Gemini Eyes’ might well be the more floaty of the productions on offer on the EP, due out this Valentine’s Day, but with its sandpapered edges, scuffed synthesizers and far off kick drum it’s more of a turmoil inducer, coming on more cerebral than the obvious smash and blap of ‘Thuddd’ or the fierce head nod of ‘No Coincidence.’
As Pictures themselves put it in some early correspondence: “it's pretty fresh compared to all the other stuff that seems to be cycling around and there’s not a 2step beat in sight.” From one listen their point is overtly evident; Kato’s music is at once hypnotically subtle and tempered like gravel, probably the over-riding reason we wanted to see what he’d throw down for his contribution to our mix series…
1. Leyland Kirby- ‘The Sound of Music Vanishing’
2. Harmonia and Eno- ‘Vanos Companeros’
3. Kassem Mosse- ‘Untitled’
4. Chairman Kato- ‘Streets Of Rage’
5. Lukid- ‘Rags’
6. Bat For Lashes- ‘Glass (Chairman Kato’s Rework)’
7. Hype Williams- ‘Rescue Dawn’
8. Fabulous Three- ‘Answer Me Softly’
9. Radiohead- ‘The Gloaming’
10. Redshape- ‘Manhattan’
11. Wbeeza- ‘Southern Girl’
12. Shed- ‘My R-Class’
13. John Roberts- ‘Navy Blue’
14. Luke Abbott- ‘Trans Forest Alignment’
15. Joy Division- ‘A Means To An End’
16. Com Truise- ‘Sundripped’
17. Broadcast- ‘You And Me In Time’
18. Chairman Kato- ‘Gemini Eyes (Teasmith version)’
The Wildfire EP is out on Pictures Music this Valentine’s Day.