Kagami Smile is the project of Ryan Hill from Illinois, USA, whose works of shoegaze and post-rock influenced, intimate blend of techno and ambient appeared since 2016 on outcomes such as Gin & Platonic, Vacuum PRESS / 眞空出版, House of The Leg, Pure Life Records, Tekres, Dream Catalogue, BLCR Laboratories, SØVN, and much more. The vastly prolific artist, also active with his other moniker Chimess, left 2019 with the last-minute, self-released Flower In A Door album, featuring compositions of urban solitude cloaked in a heavy blast of reverberating sounds.
Coming from an industrial city a few hours from Chicago, Kagami Smile reportedly takes influence, other than from labels such as Modern Love and Chain Reaction, from the “strange meetings with strangers in recurring dreams” he has. His dreamy take on techno and electronic music is evident in his often very long tracks in which the listener is brought on the line between awakeness and a tender yet tragic oblivion. In particular, Kagami Smile has been often linked with “ghost tech“, a sub-variation of the post-vaporwave culture known for bringing together industrial techno and post-Internet aesthetics, ultimately resulting in works of exciting experimental club tunes one can appreciate listening to other producers such as Chungking Mansions, Somnus, and Mod-Comm 81.
We’re glad to present you our 63rd entry in our GUESTMIX series, a (funnily enough) 63-minutes-long mix of melodies submerged in a chaotic disaster of clattering, metallic percussions. Before pushing the button, remember to follow Kagami Smile on Soundcloud and Facebook. Enjoy!
TRACKLIST
Jetski – Acclimate
Heavenworld – Side II
Norwell – celestial bodies (imre kiss crisis 91 mix)
Mod-comm 81 – we float
Independence Ave Orchestra – welfare
Shinichi Atobe – first plate 3
Newworldaquarium – the tide you can’t feel
Rawaat – Exp 2
Chungking Mansions – ??
Raw MT – La Duna
S Olbricht – Floa1
Ross 154 – Sun
Aleks – Pool Daze
Weniwasu – Through the ground
Kagami Smile – Human 1A
Shinichi Atobe – the red line
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We are a non-profit organization registered in December 2018, operating since late 2015 as a webzine and media website. In early 2017, we started our own event series focused on arts, experimental, and dancefloor-oriented music. We reject every invocation to “the Future” meant as the signifier for capitalistic “progress” and “innovation”, fully embracing the Present instead; we renounce any reckless and ultimately arbitrary division between “high” and “low”, respectable and not respectable, “mind” and “body”; we support and invite musicians, artists, and performers having diverse backgrounds and expressing themselves via variegated artistic practices.