KMRU Schallplatten & CDs

Review: Uganda keeps on giving, with the country currently at the forefront of sub-Saharan Africa's electronic underground: a fertile corner of the world in terms of emerging and established talent. Enter Hibotep, a Kampala-based rising star who was born and raised in Ethiopia but grew up in Somalia. Joining her on this EP, another one to know from the Ugandan capital, Hibo Elmi, a DJ, filmmaker, fashion designer, installation artist, rapper and studio head considered to be one of the most important female dance music makers on the continent right now. Running the gamut from 'Amber''s dark, hypnotising dub-hop moves, through 'Ebwino's sparse, weightless tones, which eventually give way to playful stepping rhythm beneath the relentless microphone skills of MC Will'stone, and 'Saffron' with its slow mo, exotic shuffle, if those responsible for this EP themselves reflect the incredible diversity of the city's scene, the sounds do the same.

Review: Introducing his own label OFNOT, acclaimed ambient artist KMRU presents an album which takes an inventive approach to the idea of environmental recordings. Having captured sounds from countless places encountered on his travels as an artist, he decided to explore the waveforms of these recordings and use them as a guide for his own synthesis. The source material is not present in the resulting album, but rather informs the movement of the sound, once again confirming KMRU's gift as a producer and offering a different way to think about sound and its relationship to place.

Review: The prolific pace of KMRU's elevated ambience continues to run in contrast to the patient, considered sonic content with this new release for Finnish label Other Power. The three long-form pieces contained on this release were commissioned by the Helsinki curatorial and commissioning agency PUBLICS, and as ever it's an opportunity for the Nairobi-born artist to reflect upon environmental sound and audible architecture, framing his field recordings in elegant, sustained spatial sound design which ranks amongst some of the most engaging contemporary ambient in circulation right now.