Kenji Araki

Ghosts whisper a sweet song over a grim hum in the background: it could be the onset of an R’n’B tune, but the beats are so harsh and abrasive that they seem to notch and cleave the Klangraum sound space; what was just trying to claw its way up to reach for the light is sucked down into a black hole: thunk. That’s the mood of the music produced by the Austrian-Japanese artist Kenji Araki. His alien rhythms are as warped as those of Arca, his melodies as schizoid as the hyperpop of Sophie and A. G.
Cook. But he transcends these references with his very own style, raw and futuristic, de-subjectivised and full of conflicting emotions.