Fat pixel mix-down

>> The Suzuki Kid’s digital damage

by MICHAEL CITROME

Commodore Business Machines stopped making the Amiga computer back when Michael Keaton was Batman and Heavy D was on the charts, but that doesn’t stop the Suzuki Kid from making music with one. He likes the sound that comes out of the Amiga’s silicon guts—but he’s no retro-tronic act.
“I think that now, you have to be more aware of what your computer can do, but back in the ’80s it was capable of anything,” says the hardcore electronic producer and DJ—“Hardcore as in hip hop and rap, not as far as metal and straight edge and that shit.”
The Kid, already known for manning the beat box in sensational analog synth combo the Unireverse, has a slew of projects to drop on unsuspecting audiences in the next year. The first will be 2002 AC/DC , an eight-track, CD-only release on Total Zero records. The record showcases the Kid’s “cracked-out, dopey” MCing on half the tracks, the others left vocal-less so listeners can bust their own rhymes.
At the same time, the Unireverse is all geared up to head back into the studio to record and release a new full-length sometime in the first quarter of ’02. Also in the works is the Suzuki Kid MP3 box set, a multi-hour computer-only compilation.
But just because the Suzuki Kid uses the technology doesn’t mean he loves it. “If you go on MP3.com, you can hear a couple of hundred bands you’ve never heard before—and they’re all bad. It’s so crazy that people think pointing and clicking is how you do it. You need a song in your head for Pro Tools to work.” Check the Suzuki Kid out on the Web at artists.mp3s.com/artists/66/suzuki_kid.html. :