Visionary scratch DJ and producer Kid Koala (aka Eric San) is preparing to release the Floor Kids Original Video Game Soundtrack on April 27th via Arts & Crafts - a 42-track project featuring 71 minutes of original instrumental hip-hop and break music from the award-winning video game, Floor Kids.
In anticipation, Kid Koala shares new single "Five Spot Stomp" with BrooklynVegan today, pairing a rumbling upright bass and a classic break - complete with dropouts and handclaps from the crew - giving a nod to the influence funk and jazz left on hip-hop. San comments: "'Five Spot Stomp' is a track from a location called The Corner in the video game. JonJon showed me a concept sketch he had done of this location, complete with a crowd of kids standing around cheering on the battle. My goal was to make a track that would fit the visuals he had created. I kept the rhythm target hits relatively simple since it's still in the early part (level 2) of the game.Tone-wise, it was fun to make a track that nodded to the beats I grew up listening to when I was in high school, the ones built around a lost loop of an old jazz club jam. I played some upright bass and drums and recorded them with an old RCA ribbon microphone. I then re-sampled all the layers into this very strange Vestax 10 bit sampler to get that crunchy sound, and added a few scratches here and there. Those are my daughters doing the countdowns in the track. We had a lot of fun jumpin' around in the studio that day!"
An original concept by award-winning animator bboy JonJon and Kid Koala himself, Floor Kids captures the essence of what makes "breaking" an artform unlike any other. Adding another dimension to the universe of multimedia projects San has created over a twenty-year career, Kid Koala scores a timeless journey across every era of the break, from silky '70s funk, to thumping '80s 808s, granular '90s 12bit hip-hop, and 00's synth funk.
Kid Koala has toured with the likes of Radiohead, Beastie Boys, Arcade Fire, A Tribe Called Quest, and DJ Shadow. He has contributed to film scores and soundtracks for Shaun Of The Dead, Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, Baby Driver, and composed music for Adult Swim, Cartoon Network, Sesame Street, and the National Film Board of Canada. His most recent album, Music To Draw To: Satellite, an ambient epic featuring Emilíana Torrini, is nominated for the JUNO Award for Electronic Album Of The Year.
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