Ahnnu – Koko (ahnnu.bandcamp.com)
The latest release from Richmond’s Chocolate Milk hip hop collective, Koko by Ahnnu, is five tracks of pure musical zen. The arrival of the beat maker’s first release in nearly two years is cause for excitement for anyone who heard 2009’s sensationally serene and much applauded Def Vibrations. Ahnnu’s laid-back tempos and bass-heavy beats float through an atmosphere of sparse instrumental samples and voices, as jazz flutes intertwine with the subtle looped sounds that undulate and pull at the rhythm like the tides of the sea. There is a very natural sound to this release in comparison to much of Ahnnu’s past work. He chooses organic percussion sounds and the sound of the human voice on tracks like “Kalibre” and “Brute” over the more digitally familiar sounds of his electronic work.
The second half of the album descends like nightfall into a darker, more fractured array of breakbeats and stuttered starts and stops. “Deep” moves and crawls through the stereo as fractured elements of synths and vocals collide with the dizzying world of drums and samples, only to come out the other side with the highly filtered Motown bounce of the track “Kokoloop.” The song sounds like a Diana Ross cassette slowly melting as a house burns down around it, dripping in digital manipulation and keeping up the slight unease of the second half of the album, which contrasts excellently with the first half’s blissful warmth. Its warbling strings and horns call out a mellow goodbye to the listener, as the meditative illusion floats away.
Ahnnu – Koko (ahnnu.bandcamp.com)
The latest release from Richmond’s Chocolate Milk hip hop collective, Koko by Ahnnu, is five tracks of pure musical zen. The arrival of the beat maker’s first release in nearly two years is cause for excitement for anyone who heard 2009’s sensationally serene and much applauded Def Vibrations. Ahnnu’s laid-back tempos and bass-heavy beats float through an atmosphere of sparse instrumental samples and voices, as jazz flutes intertwine with the subtle looped sounds that undulate and pull at the rhythm like the tides of the sea. There is a very natural sound to this release in comparison to much of Ahnnu’s past work. He chooses organic percussion sounds and the sound of the human voice on tracks like “Kalibre” and “Brute” over the more digitally familiar sounds of his electronic work.
The second half of the album descends like nightfall into a darker, more fractured array of breakbeats and stuttered starts and stops. “Deep” moves and crawls through the stereo as fractured elements of synths and vocals collide with the dizzying world of drums and samples, only to come out the other side with the highly filtered Motown bounce of the track “Kokoloop.” The song sounds like a Diana Ross cassette slowly melting as a house burns down around it, dripping in digital manipulation and keeping up the slight unease of the second half of the album, which contrasts excellently with the first half’s blissful warmth. Its warbling strings and horns call out a mellow goodbye to the listener, as the meditative illusion floats away.
