Inndigital Magazine | A Day With Kisk

Italian DJ/producer & label manager, Giuseppe D'Alessandro aka Kisk, is the mastermind behind the Apparel Music label pool. Since 1998 he has developed a unique atmospheric sound with a number of different styles. As is so often the case with new directions in music it is often the BPM linked to the heart beat which determines the genre, whereas Kisk prefers to define the genre through the tempo instead of the sound. As well as a DJ and producer, he is an artist and curator, with works from boxes at fashion shows, to art exhibitions by contemporary multimedia projects such as discokit®, ONEBOY and TAJIbpm, yet he remains firmly rooted with head and heart in the club music industry. Since 2004 the development of his sound and a solid old-school culture of many kinds make Kisk a complete musician who is constantly evolving. He has released tracks on labels around the world such as Multi Vitamins, Darek Recording, Seta Label, Miniatura, Nuhar, 11hz records and more, as well as having several collaborations with international artists like Lopazz, SCSI-9, Yapacc, Eddie Zarook, Tuccillo, Elon, Ekkohaus, Ali Kuru, Moodymanc, George G, Casio Casino, Lula Circus and many others. Inndigital met for you Giuseppe D'Alessandro and what better occasion to give him a few questions that can help to expose and raise awareness about the origins of Kisk project and Apparel Music.

Never before in recent years, the "house music" has changed its codes, becoming more plural, more global, what is your thoughts on this?
House Music: music made at home. Dj pioneer Frankie Knuckles came home one day and decided to put up some simple sounds on the reels, thus inventing the loop to facilitate the shift from one disk to another, to create and build the continuity it needed: as conjunctions in discourse, part of the rules of musical grammar, useful and have become indispensable to the work of a disk jockey. From here, the house takes shape and function, enters the night, garages, streets, under the skin. Inevitable influence in the years to follow, transforming the house and dismembered in acid-house, tech house, deep house; I personally have never had trouble classifying the music, because I use a foolproof method: the Bpm, or the beat per minute, the velocity of blood, meaning and the emotion that creates in us a certain pattern. To me there isn't a genre, the music is categorized by its speed in a given space. Everything that goes around, bass, kick, snare, synth are just the colors of the groove and the explication of an idea/sound in a space. Each genre creates a style that is not only music, it becomes a real way of being, to communicate. I just try to make me speak more languages without influence from any.

Is it possible that something is lost in this storm of changes in music?
In the chaos of the multiplication and distribution possibilities of the genres - without going deep into the digital-analog conflict, of which there is much to say - the risk of low quality is canceled by the ability of the listener to choose. There are people who love to seek and composers who want to create a new sound recovering the tradition. Eventually the search for beauty, of course not in all cases, what remains, hopefully...

Kisk, since 2009 you are at the head of Apparel Music, one of the label's most prolific and interesting in contemporary Italian landscape: what are the principles behind the project? Apparel is becoming an increasing consideration and respect throughout the world, what is the formula for growth so fast?
Apparel Music: my dream (and a lot of effort). Yes, I have always dreamed of something like that. From when I was playing the accordion at age 9, in the end it was inside me, I have done nothing but feed it. Then one day I met my partner, she gave me the belief. A few years after my daughter was born which gave me the strength. Finally my partner, who believed in this dream and gave me the opportunity to achieve it. Jazzy is my way of interpreting this. Jazzy means the human factor, our greatest resource. Sharing, fairness, passion are the ingredients of a project that aims to promote the new producer, new musicians, artists. We're just the new generation of filters, maybe a little too virtual generation, but certainly just as well-structured as jazz that recurs in an electronic key, while remaining anchored to the foundations of free expression.

The graphics of the publications of Apparel Music causes an infection and urges immediate curiosity. What and who, animate the visions of Apparel Music?
Through the graphics we needed to represent this world, apparently simple but sick, full of little background. 'Luke Lsb' was perfect. An artist, a friend, a graduate in philosophy, so dreamy, but with method. His drawings, crayon or tempera seem made for/by children, but they hide fantastic and amazing microcosms; like contemporary's musical loops, which once well-arranged becames a true stones.

Imagine yourself in ten years: where are you and what are you doing?
I hope just to be there.