A proper outsider music type, deliciously batty producer and sound-collagist Mihkel Kleis launched his Ratkiller alias sometime around 2011, trying to catch his idiosyncratic impression of everything that can be called “contemporary electronic club music”.
Although, as he has said: “I still don’t know how it actually should be done. In a way I am like a parrot – I like to imitate but I don’t have any clue what I’m saying.” After several tape-releases on labels Rotifer Cassettes, Baba Vanga, ;paranoia and Crash Symbols, “Meltdown of the Highest Order” is his first material on vinyl released by Estonia’s Porridge Bullet. “Meltdown” is an output by artist who can listen to and absorb myriad other sounds and transduce them into something of his own.
Ratkiller creates a parallel sound for pop music, full of chopped ’n screwed hip hop noise, frazzled electronics, convulsive cut-ups and blown-out ambience, where sophisticated ideas and clear forms illuminate each other. “Meltdown’s” cold-blooded charm also includes the fact that the music itself is actually listening to the melomaniac listening to it and not turning him/her off.
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