Harris and Harsh. Kirkwood West and HarshPro. Jeffrey and Matt. The Squirrel and Wolfbear. However you may have heard of these two larger-than-life personalities and their various projects and monikers, these two frolicking friends of the forest will be at Mike ‘N Molly’s tonight for Slow and Low. Kirkwood West will lace us with deep grooves while HarshPro accompanies the slomo beats with video.
When I first met Jeffrey Harris back in 2006–7, he was producing much more uptempo techno/tech house under the name Hydrogen. I met Matt Harsh at the very same nonparty (RIP UCDNB!) and he was doing, as he is now, amazing video projects. One of the first things I remember with the Harris and Harsh combined is this video Harsh made with several members of the now-defunct 217mafia at an IMC event—Hydrogen is featured in the middle of the video clip:
Over the years, Harris’s style has mellowed and moved more into the laid-back slomo deep house genre and that’s when Harris killed off his Hydrogen persona and created Kirkwood West. Under this new moniker, Kirkwood West chose a personal totem to represent his brand—the squirrel. He has used it in his promotional materials, his online branding, and in his tracks. Harsh and Kirkwood West made a slomo track regarding this new Squirrel World Kirkwood West was building:
In recent months, Kirkwood has moved from away from DJing and instead is focusing on production. Currently, he is working out of a studio in Downtown Champaign where he collaborates with other local producers and DJs and MCs as well as out-of-town friends and former C-U residents that come back to visit or that might be passing through town. Kirkwood has created a number of side projects in order to have fun and create tracks with many folks. Same Haircut, Ninja in Heat, Time Navigators—all have put out tracks—though I think most have been scrubbed from the interwebs other than Same Haircut. He’s worked with Reed Richards both on tracks and in collaboration for slow-mo patio events at the now-closed Café Luna and the amazing back patio at the Highdive.
Kirkwood West put out a three-track EP on Subtrak in 2009 called Artifical Barrier. His most recent spotlight occurred via his day job at Deep Silver Volition. One of his tracks, “Speedball”, made its way into Saints Row IV. Several fans have uploaded his track to YouTube (which he enjoyed immensely, by the way), and at present time, the several videos combined have approximately 6,000 views.
This track, “Speedball”, is a very true representation of the Kirkwood West sound. It’s a deep, 100 bpm smooth slide into the slomo sound. And this is exactly the kind of tracks Kirkwood produces and selects. One of the things I love about Kirkwood West tracks is that they are all usually at least six or seven minutes. He has a couple tracks that are around 11 minutes long. This long-format slow house beat gives him room to explore the deep—deep chord progressions, deep bass, deep loops, just all the deeps… Combine these deep house beats with Harsh Pro’s always-inventive video skills and Mike ‘N Molly’s cozy setting, and I’d suggest you get there early. Expect Mike ‘N Molly’s to be the perfect space for Kirkwood West’s deep house grooves and HarshPro’s visuals.
This isn’t the first time Harsh and Harris have worked together—and it won’t be the last. The combined energy of these two artists are not to be missed. Here’s Harsh videoing Harris in front of Exile on Main a couple years ago… if you’re lucky, you might get to see this in real life:
Now—if you were paying attention while watching that last video by Harsh, you might have noticed a certain reclusive, bearded DJ in the background doing something we like to call “mixing records.” It is has been alleged that this particular former resident DJ at Boltini and DJ Belly will be doing an all-vinyl night at Mike ‘N Molly’s on Saturday, December 28th. I can’t remember the last time I saw Belly and Mertz booked together—though I’m sure it has to have been since the Dubstep Massacre shows. Both of the shows should be great fun with good music.