Endtroducing … Kutiman

Pub date April 2, 2009
WriterMarke B.
SectionNoise

By Marke B. Kutiman, “Wait for Me” In the future when vids are vinyl, and vinyl is — what? La Chanson de Roland, maybe — people might claim that Kutiman, the Israeli Vegas Pro genius who collages up backwater YouTube vids into breathtaking electronic atmospheric joyrides (see the complete work at http://thru-you.com), was the DJ Shadow of the ’00s. Kutiman, “I M New” I think those people would be wrong (and there are already a number of them). Searching through the all the minor dreck of YouTube to fish out suitable usable samples and build them into destabilized microsymphonies can surely be compared to Shadow’s impeccable crate-diving technique. And the dense sound both derive from their purely sample-driven compositions elicits a similar melancholy (why is that?). But Shadow traded in rarity nostalgia — who the hell else had that 78, man? — whereas Kutiman’s brilliant corners are purely of the moment and completely accessible to all. Except for one of them, now set to “private,” ha. Kutiman is also way more international in musical scope than Shadow — something perhaps more necessary in our globalized age, that Shadow could only hint towards in his Endtroducing… ’90s heyday — which brings Kutiman more in line with the likes of that other frequent Bay boy Amon Tobin, another sample-based innovator who opened the West’s ears to a different native music contextuality and who eschewed nostalgia in favor of up-to-the-minute headtrip breaks. Kutiman, Babylon Band