One of the leaders of the thriving local beats scene, producer and DJ Justin Elwin, aka Kit Pop, is about to release his latest effort, Seams. He chats with JOSHUA HAYES about the EP, which will be released as a free download next week.
Seams was originally intended to be released through Sunday Records, run by Elwin’s frequent collaborator Ta-ku. He will be lending a helping hand to Sunday Records, having founded and run the local Paper Chain record label from 2007 until it closed shop last year. However, when the new imprint’s first release was scheduled for next year, Elwin decided to release the EP through his Bandcamp page. “I thought I’d put it up now for free to get it out there and off my chest,” he says.
Elwin describes Seams, which he has been working on in between other projects, as “future R’n’B sounding” and exploring mellower trap and beats sounds. “I thought all of those songs were my interpretation of modern music that I like at the moment,” he adds.
He also describes it as an extension of his debut EP, 2011’s Smoke Cloud. “Smoke Cloud was kind of looped samples and stuff like that, whereas this one the same sort of idea but using a lot more modern sounds and modern ways of making music. Smoke Cloud was what I was making at the moment from music I was listening to, and this is another example of my own interpretation of stuff that I’ve been listening to, kind of like a meld of everything,” he says.
Although Elwin says Smoke Cloud didn’t generate much buzz here in Australia, it got quite a lot of high rotation on European radio, especially in France – not that this bothers him. “I’m not really fussed on the whole radio situation,” he says. “I just make the music for whoever wants to play it, so if they want to play it, that’s fine, [but if they don’t] I don’t really give a shit.”
Elwin notes that a full length debut would be another year or two away, as he continues to refine his sound. Despite this, he has been putting ideas aside. “I’ve still got heaps of different material that I’m writing, and some of them I still put aside in that folder that says ‘Album’. I keep going back to it every now and then and seeing if it will work,” he says.
In the meantime, amongst other projects that he’s keeping under wraps, Elwin has been busy working on remixes for Sydney acts Wave Racer and Cosmo’s Midnight, which should be released in the coming months.
Elwin also says he and Ta-ku may round out the year with a new mixtape, #BEATS, following their previous collaborations #EATS and the recently released #TREATS, which received over 50,000 plays and generated international interest. “#BEATS we just thought would be, playing with stupid words, but getting a lot of local producers and Australian producers to submit beats. We just thought it would be a good platform to get music that hasn’t been heard out from Australia.”
