On those occasions when assaults of junglist syncopation aren’t hitting the spot, I often satiate my appetite for electronically generated lunacy with breakcore. During a recent venture on to bandcamp, it was my pleasure to come across Lil Kevo 303. Intrigued by both his manic barrage of sounds and idiosyncratic visual style, I set out to find out more…
Let’s start with some details of your recent release…
‘Nightmare Tundra‘ is an album of stuff I’ve made over the past 6 months. It’s coming out on Kitty on Fire Records and will be available as digital download and cassette tape.
Any standout tracks that would appeal to Sonic Nutrition readers?
Sonic Nutrition seems like a lot of DNB stuff. The track Özgür_170f is the only track I could really imagine a DNB DJ ever really playing off the album.
Otherwise I’d say Dirty_Sprite_187f, just because that’s my favorite one lol.
You also run your own label, Brk Fast. Can you give us a brief overview of the roster?
It’s me and my friends but also Soundcloud breakcore kids that I dig and haven’t published their stuff. I started the label so I could release the music of Shitwiz because it was not avaliable for download anywhere.
I first discovered your work via the alias Ancient Origin. I’m curious to what (if any) reason you have for maintaining this second nom-de-plume beyond the Pokemon reference…
It’s not a Pokemon reference. It’s a really old alias I made when I was a kid. I ditched it for reasons similar to that; when you google it, everything that pops up is from the Pokemon card series (Ancient Origins). Also girls would ask me what my DJ name was and I just couldn’t look them in the eye and say Ancient Origin.
And while we’re talking about aliases, has lil Kevo 069 had anything to say about 303?
I had to google this to see what it was. There’s like, a million Lil Kevo xxx’s. I’m the only one who’s not doing hip hop. A lot of people tell me the name is not original and that I sound like a rapper or this and that. But I’m making hyperspeed shit and I think it sounds cool and if you google it it comes up first so who really gives a shit.
Another aspect of what you do that I’m drawn to is the consistent visual style of your website and album covers. Is this something that you do yourself or do you have an in-house artist?
All the art is done by me. I spent my younger years as a Gamecube junkie; it just feels natural for me to make everything look like Super Monkey Ball / Animal Crossing.
I would describe the style as ‘peak geo-cities meets otaku culture’. Would you consider that a fair description?
Spot on bro. Massive compliment.
There are also, to my eye, overtones of vaporwave aesthetics across the site. Is this a subculture that has influenced you?
Yeah. I think vaporwave music is for the most part garbage but I’ve always dug the aestheic of it. There are aspects of the music I dig but I can’t tell you one song I’ve ever downloaded (Someone Special by Tomatoism but I think thats technically future funk)
You’ve also made music for a number of video games. How does this compare to producing material that’s aimed at the dancefloor or a club environment?
It’s totally different. Cause for the dance music you need to have like the intro and shit so you can blend it and whatnot. But for the video game stuff if often needs to jump right from the start. For example in a battle theme you can’t have even like a 10 second intro you just have to jump immediately into the meat and potatoes to get the vibe rolling right.
Things can be more melodic. You can also do more with the spatial mixing, since you can assume that video game music will always be played in a stereo environment (not true for bass music unfortunately). It’s less about getting the ass shaking and more about getting the mind wandering.
Continuing in this vein, are there any video games, or animes for that matter, that you’d recommend?
ご注文はうさぎですか?
My favorite anime. The voice acting and writing is so great. Music is great. I’ve probably watched every episode twice.
Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt
I absoltuly love the aestic vibe of this show. It’s so different and hypersexualized, I love it so much. The only anime which is acceptable to watched dubbed.
Animal Crossing (The original one for the GCN/N64)
Grew up playing this with my friends. The music and the visuals have impacted me on levels I can’t even explain. The new AC is great but the original really has that special visual and sonic aesthetic (戸高 一生 is really a god).
Super Monkey Ball 2
Always loved the aesthetic and sounds of this one. The checkboard floor and DNB fusion stuff especially.
Breakcore isn’t typically what I cover on Sonic Nutrition. What artists and labels should I be looking out for as well as Lil Kevo 303 and Brk Fast?
I’ve slowed down on Brk Fast to spend more time focusing more on my own production as well as the video game work (only 24 hours in a day). You should check out Kitty on Fire Records and Suck Puck Records for all the dankest breakcore. Also I have a new project with Calculon called Chu Hi which we debuted on Shoot Recordings. We’ve signed an EP to The Dreamer’s Recordings which I’m very excited about.
You’re from Boston and, on the webpage, I’ve noticed that you’ve performed several gigs in the city over the past couple of years. Is that indicative of a healthy scene within the city?
Yeah we have some people who throw some cool stuff here (shout out to @Buttcliff and Lenore of Elements). In the past year or so I’ve become less involved with the local scene. All I want to do is grind in the studio and tour. No breakcore stuff here, just sometimes my friends who do noise or techno stuff will throw me on the bill (or sometimes I spin DNB). We just had a venue (Great Scott) close permanently due to the virus. Who knows what the scene will be like after all of this.
Any artists we should keep an eye out for?
Nick Mineri, Pete Dev/Null (8205 Recordings)… I don’t really know who else is putting out stuff around here… a lot of my friends just DJ, lol (shout out Glowworm and DJ Won’t)
At the end of last year you played a gig in Istanbul, a city I have little knowledge of beyond reading a couple of Orhan Pamuk novels. Can you tell us a bit about the show?
My friend Calculon invited me to play with him there. There is an amazing club there called Pixie which is owned and operated by Özgür. Pixie is an amazing place the people who hang there are the dopest (NABER ABIMMMMMM).
I love the city so much, the food is fucking amazing and the people are so chill. Özgür who runs the club is one of the greatest people I have ever met. I can’t say enough about the city or the people other than I plan to go back (hopefully a few times)!!!!
Everybody should go to Istanbul and play at Pixie. Seems to be a lot of cool jungle/breakcore/DNB stuff going on there. Shout out Devo, Özge, Erce, Ece
You’ve mentioned a few names in the preceding paragraphs, is there anyone else that you’d like to mention before we wrap up…
Nik Calculon, Henrietta Lockheart, Spencer Williams, Özgür
Catch up with the latest happenings in Lil Kevo’s world at his website, and instagram. And have a listen at SoundCloud.
