Futurist: A Mosaic of Time
InsightsWritten by Frank Pomes on
Kirk Young is something of a young savant when it comes to music. We’ve heard this tale often. A youth gifted with an immense talent beyond his years demonstrating a creative impulse which spans across lifetimes. He wields his modular instruments with an unnatural ease and familiarity, its almost like he’s done this before. His love of music seems ingrained in a deeply felt way. Possessing a clear intuitive understanding of percussion, texture and timbre is what led him into the direction of sound design within neuro and dubstep. Eventually into the realms of idm and techno where he resides now.
Humble in his own way, Kirk Young’s discography as Futurist spans playtime on Noisia radio, Ignite Recordings, Open Outlets, Satellite Era, Assembly Line, Interval Audio, and a host of self-releases over the years.
Here’s a brief history of his tale, as we lead up to the present moment in time and his recent release “A Mosaic of Time” out now on Satellite Era.
At the early age of 13, after years of playing piano, Futurist encountered Skrillex which began his origin story and earliest forays into electronic music. Around this time young Futurist got his first cell phone and downloaded Soundcloud and began pillaging the internet in search of more obscure electronic frequencies. It wasn’t long before he discovered Noisia and the track ‘Could This Be’. This was a crucial and formative experience for the impressionable teen.
For him, this was the moment when he realized that he could no longer be a passive recipient of music, he had to get behind the wheel and learn how to make it. He discovered that music could be an outlet for his love of film and cinematography as well, using vocal samples and cinematic scenes as inspiration for his work. School wasn’t very helpful - he admits to failing two music theory classes and having an informal understanding of music as a whole, but it was through school he got his hands on Reason and began making beats every day. He began building a world he could immerse himself in.
Originating with seismic sized bangers of neuro and halftime varieties in 2018, he found his earliest releases with Forest Biz founded by Badjah, an experimental outlet which stood at the edging abyss of progressive neuro-halftime for a crystalline moment in Soundcloud and internet history and still pushes out quality releases today. Some of these collaborations with lurkers like Kurve and Redacted led to tracks like 33repeat, Viscious and SIN which appeared on the sensational Noisia Radio and is still racking up plays.
Kirk found many of his musical connections through these circles and early relationships. These friendships continue to remain central to his Futurist musical persona. Kirk acknowledges there’s no doubt the support of interactive network and sense of community helped him push his musical development to where it is today. It was during this time he met Viktor Kadić whose artistic prowess braces the cover of this release and also has been paired with Kirk’s artwork from the beginning. It was also through these early Forest Biz interactions where Kirk came into contact with the earliest remnants of Satellite Era before its orbit even began.
He met Amir Mashayekhi aka STREETS through mutual connected with Badjah and Forest Biz. Even back then, before founding Satellite Era Amir was known as a tastemaker, curator, and well informed musician from the Chicago club scene - sharing his knowledge across forums, discords and group pages on the web. His open ear and encouragement from early on gave Futurist the reassurance to continue to push and develop his sound in different directions while continuing to find his musical voice. It only seemed to make sense that when Satellite Era came into being, that it would be the place for Kirk’s first mature release. Over 3 years in the making, that day has finally come.
A Mosaic in Time signifies how the shifting tiles of Kirk’s musical experimentation over the years weaves a deeper harmony and cohesive persona behind his music. This EP demonstrates a multiplicity of styles and sounds which emerges from his experimental style. Tracks like Madness, produced using the ‘Loquelic Iteritas Percido’ reflect a simple halftime point in his sound where the listener can get wavey and thrash about, whereas tunes like Lapis produced on a 'Mother 32' evoke more heartfelt recollections. With the track Bearer of the Curse, Futurist blends his percussive mastery with an intuitive feel for melodic harmonies created by a 'Intellijel Rainmaker' creating a fusion of the tangible with the intangible. Ethereal with physical felt presence of percussive snares and a haunting vocal sample from Dark Souls 2.
The title ‘A Mosaic of Time’ originated from an Andre Tarkovsky quote where he discussed film as a mosaic made of time, capturing material moments and presenting them together as a form of art. During a period of intense writers block which lasted over two years, Kirk found himself making music continuously but being unsatisfied with the results. Even during the midst of this period, his output was prolific but the music felt hollow. It wasn’t until one night, Kirk created a modular patch which whispered melodies which sounded like memories of his future. He remembers sitting back in his chair and closing his eyes while he felt everything click into place.
“I felt like I was dormant and then I woke up.”
A resurgence of energy and inspiration seep back into him and he knew this modular patch was only the beginning, as it later became the title track for this release ‘A Mosaic of Time’. The rest of the EP came over the next several years as he continued to explore the rebirth and of his love of his craft. A true mosaic of time comprised of different shaded shifting nodes and access points in moments of his musical journey, it was clear Viktor Kadic would do the art. With floral arrangements, masterful photography, color sense and graphic design, he constructed a cover art which really speaks to the feelings of spring and new beginnings. Its amazing to see the development of so many creatives and friendships, working together still over half a decade as their skillsets come to greater maturity and professionalism.
"Having been good friends with Kirk (Futurist) for years, getting our visions together for the cover art was an incredibly smooth process. We've worked together many times in the past and share a lot of our tastes in media in aesthetics, and he loosely instructed me in the direction of nature / spring and the Tarkovsky inspiration behind the EP. I based the colour scheme and the matter of the cover heavily on Tarkovsky's 1972 film Solaris, the scenes taking place on Earth in particular, and the hazy washed out greenery in the faint blueish morning light right before sunrise. I used a couple different photos of mine and overlayed and interweaved them, going for a simplistic design for the rest of the overlay as to not divert attention from the flora, setting all the text and design elements onto the black strip on the side. "~ Viktor Kadic on Mosaic of Time Artwork
Kirk finds the most joy in pushing a song as far as he can within a single session, finding the exploratory and intuitive process within the moment to be the most fulfilling and easiest place for him to lose himself for hours on end. He feels right at home with modular and generative music, finding the physical manipulation of hardware to correspond with his particular cognitive and bodily makeup. Probably a nod back to his early piano days and preference to do something with his hand beyond clicking and working with text on a screen. He likens his relation to music and the modular interface as something akin to a geometrical, spatial and felt relation as opposed to a conceptual and algebraic sort of interface. Thinking back, he remembers Noer the Boy and SHADES being the inspirations behind his modular beginnings.
"There's something about the generative nature of modular equipment that fascinates me. I use so many generative techniques in my music. There's something cool about the idea of the instrument kind of being a band member rather than just like a tool for you because it's never all random. The final product is never all random because all random does sound bad. But there's something really fun about fine tuning that random and then getting those sweet spots. Finding the sweet spots on the modular, and getting it right now is one of my favorite experiences on earth. I could do that all day. When you're plodding along and all of sudden a that noise comes out of it and it surprises you! I never know what I did to make that sound happen. I'm always just kind of fucking around and then it comes out no where. I remember an interview with EPROM where he said something that made me realize there’s almost spiritual or intuitive aspect with using modular. He spoke about “hidden voltages” It was the first time I’d heard described modular this way, and it that really stuck with me. He probably didn't mean it in a deep way, but for some reason it really stuck with me. "~ Kirk
"When you turn that thing on, it's all running. Everything is going all the time. The electricity is all spinning, turning and it's on, it's running. You're unearthing it. You're unearthing these quote unquote, “hidden voltages” is what EPROM said. I just thought that was the coolest thing ever. There's something about modular equipment. When you switch it on, it's kind of alive. It's got to warm up. It's got to wake up. You got to wait a little bit. You can hear a you can hear the hiss. There's always that little bit of feedback which I love to keep the feedback of my synth in. I don't remove that at all. I don't know, there's something that's cool about the idea of it. I'm kind of playing with wild electricity in a sense. It's like it's an animal, or an orchestra I’m conducting or band I’m playing with to go back to that analogy. I feel like I’m playing with it and its communicating to me in a sense."~ Kirk
Recently graduating from university and now teaching as a guest lecturer on film audio, post and pre-production. Kirk finds himself with a lot of time on his hands. And unburdened with his monumental release, perhaps he’ll go back to playing with some knobs and making some more mess for all of us to enjoy.
You’ll find his new release ‘A Mosaic of Time’ out now on Satellite Era on all major platforms. As well as an extensive back-catalogue of music forever archived on his Soundcloud.
