Rival Consoles - Kid Velo

The new album. released track by track. week after week. 11.4. - 27.6. 2011 london-based purveyor of intelligent dance music ryan l. west aka rival consoles returns with his sophomore album kid velo, released track by track over the course of 11 weeks. every monday will see a new album track being streamed exclusively from just one online portal connected to one exclusive online store, before going global on fridays. 'with brains supposedly adapting to online networks and attention spans reduced to 140 characters at a time, this is bite-sized music for a bite-sized world', erased tapes label founder robert raths explains. the campaign will kick off on april 11 and cumulate in the official album release on june 27, 2011. here's the viral to date: track 1: kid velo - exclusive track premiere via drowned in sound on april 11: 'we've got the very first track and it's actually really, really good' track 2: into the heart i - exclusive track premiere via the line of best fit on april 18: 'rival consoles is the geekiest band name of all time. it is lucky, then, that the music is so consistently entertaining. we are very happy to have 'into the heart', the second track from that record, as today's exclusive song of the day' track 3: s.p.k.r.s - exclusive track premiere via the 405 on april 26: 'it's bloody huge. can you imagine hearing this at full blast? it's so intense it would probably blow your eyebrows off' track 4: amiga - exclusive track premiere via mixmag on may 3. 'purveyor of intelligent and consistently entertaining dance music' track 5: i left the party - exclusive track premiere via the royal channel/bbc news/ sky news/the telegraph on may 9 as part of the big dance royal flashmob outside of buckingham palace. 'the dancers clicked their fingers, stamped their feet and shook their bodies to a mix of funky beats' to be continued... for updated information on this viral, please visit http:// erasedtapes.com/kidvelo whilst album opener kid velo can simply be described as 'a heavy beast that has a lot of pop running through its veins', ryan l. west, the man behind rival consoles strives to humanise and at the same time emphasise entirely computerised sounds to defy categorisation in modern electronic music. according to west this record was all about creating genuine emotions with a synthetic set of sounds. 'even though the sounds that have been used are entirely synthetic, like a lot of computer game music, they can create moments of human emotion - moments of hope. i really love it when electronic music can do this to you'. with track names that could be straight out of a comic strip, the atmosphere of this album reminds of video game sagas such as zelda or final fantasy. kid velo makes the perfect fictional super hero with eve being his fragile yet powerful female counterpart and vos as the classic antagonist. tracks like s.p.k.r.s. evoke images of an evil, corrupt police force, lurking deep in the futuristic suburbs. surrounded by studio equipment, this record possibly is a result of spending more time with speakers than people. it doesn't take much to see some parallels between the fictional character kid velo and its creator. born in november 10th 1985, ryan l. west grew up in the small city of leicester in the midlands of england. fascinated by sound from an early age, ryan chose to dedicate his time to studying, experimenting with and producing sound at de montfort university leicester. 'the outro track after ed. stands for after education, because it just reminds me of that crap feeling you get when you finish uni. you don't know what the hell you are going to do with yourself.' rival consoles combines hard-hitting beats with catchy pop melodies, classical theory with dance. no wonder he released a split 12" with label mate ólafur arnalds' minimal-techno outfit kiasmos. there is more to this 25 year-old than meets the eye, for those not content with 4/4 beat dance floor stormers; west is fast establishing himself as both a sound designer and programmer. having repeatedly performed at the tate britain museum in london, where he drew over 2000 visitors into his unpredictable, yet detailed sound drawings '...using self-created sound manipulation tools in max/msp and super collider'. new york based composer nico muhly and uk producer jon hopkins are amongst the first to receive west's trademark remixes. previously having performed alongside venetian snares, luke vibert and wisp, summer 2011 will see first appearances at festivals. after a short promo stint to berlin, rival consoles will return to london for an album launch show at the nest in dalston on june 23.

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