Kuniaki Takenaga

Kuniaki Takenaga also known as Velarda Techno, Electro, Industrial DJ & producer born in Sapporo, Hokkaidō, Japan (1977). Kuniaki Takenaga’s music career began in 1997 influenced by The Prodigy, Ken Ishii, Fumiya Tanaka and the djs’ at the famous Juliana’s Tokyo club. Takenaga sent his first demo to Takaaki Itoh's WOLS label from which 2 tracks ended up being included in a 2003 compilation put out by Sheep Records (Germany) SH032-Various-East-Meets-West. In 2004, 2 tracks were included in SH038-Various-World-Herding-Championships-Part-1 and 2005 in SH040-Various-World-Herding-Championships-Part-2. He was also released on UK's Damon Vallero's Electracom label ECOM21-various- Components III EP (Oct 2004). His track ‘Centrals’ on the Components III EP receives praise by several respected DJs including Grovskopa (Sweden), Tuomas Rantanen (Finland) who has a track on the same EP, and Yourhighness (Maracas, Sweden) and of course Vallero (also included on the ep) whose label had released the EP. Others who recognised his unique talent included Hokkaido by Yasushi, Hiroki Esashika (Intec), Genn, Hiroaki Ilzuka (Symbolism, Soleil), and SUDO (Elektrigger), etc. A year later, in 2005, his own 4 tracks vinyl entitled Phantasmagoria (12”) MK010 was released on UK’s Manuke [Pure Plastic] label. Reviews (Boston DJ Paul Dailey http://www.pauldailey.com/techno-reviews-12705.html ) say: “Four dark, evil, rocking tracks from newcomer Kuniaki Tekenaga and the Manuke crew. The two standout cuts here are "Phantasmgoria Noel", a menacing hard rocker with ferocious rhythms and ominous synths, and "Meltybladdia" an ass-shaking, body-rocking techno mover. Strictly for the forward thinking and headstrong amongst you; this is some sinister stuff.” Per Alexei Monroe (http://sonocentric.nskstate.com/pre_post.php/14 “… within the minimal techno genre but stretch its limits... The standard punitive mechanical textures and beats are present, but alongside contrasting and even contradictory idyllic moments. They combine rigorous hard-line techno with dreamy trance atmospheres occasionally teetering on the point of pure kitsch. Takenaga's opening track Meltybladdia contains an ethereal vocal female vocal swirling around the dense machinic arrays making for a strange combination. In Marrinos the ethereal string textures are still present but are far more severely repressed by an infinitely heavier and bleaker set of beats, providing only slight flashes of colour. Deepsea is a tense standoff between more epic/"symphonic" swirling textures and an onslaught of intricate heavily mechanized beats. The strangely titled Phantasmagoria Noel is full of precision tooled metallic textures set against what could be a sampled tribal chant. In 2006, his track Phalunx is included in Asian Dynasty’s release [AD-Digital001]- Various Artists - Perfect Strangers “Hard Techno” http://www.asiandynasty.net/releases/196 Early 2008, net label Antiritmo/OffAudio [Spain] release "Granphantasm Red" [Offaudio0049] followed by the sequel "Granphantasm Blue EP" [Antiritmo#029] in May, acclaimed with presenting us his last work called Granphantasm Blue EP. This EP is composed by 4 amazing techno tracks full of energy and power focused to the dance floor… Cowbells and continuously filtered acid bleeps: Apocalyptic club music for ship hangars, via EarLabs and Tokafi. In July 2008 the track Granphazilva is included in DJ L’Embrouille’s compilation 2708 [Loopzilla, Germany - lz065} and in September 2008, the track Dis088 on various – I Love OffAudio 3/3 [Offaudio0052]. While releases of his work are happening on other labels, Takenaga was working on founding his own label and ‘becoming’ Velarda’. Velarda refers to a click/minimal and Progressive House project Takenaga began in early 2008. The principle idea is to take other DJs’ works (Japanese and international) and reinventing them. This brought him to Broken Haze (aka Keisuke Ito) who had released his first album entitled "Raid System". Some of Japan's best TECHNO DJ's – including Takenaga -- deconstructed his work and started the process of making remixes from his work. In December 2008, Asian Dynasty released ADDL 017, Broken Haze’s Raid System Ver.AD which includes Counter Attack (Kuniaki Takenaga Velarda Remix). All the tracks were remade to give the song's feel a more TECHNO feel but that could be expanded to hard techno, ambient, digital hardcore, minimal, electro house, etc. Further Velarda releases are expected via Offaudio www.offaudio.com. In 2008, he founded his music label Dispired Recordings http://dispired-industrials.syncl.jp/ http://www.myspace.com/dispiredindustrials and the rest is history. Other members of the label are Takeshi El Niño (http://www.myspace.com/takeshisatoelnino) Voidloss / Dirtybass, UK (http://www.myspace.com/dirtybassvoidloss) Marco Rane, Netherlands (http://www.myspace.com/marcorane) Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.