Pleasure Cruiser & Keita Sano – The Key

Sometimes collaborations can take years of nurturing to come into fruition and hit the record store shelves. Such was the case for the latest High Hoops EP release Tokyo Horoki Part 2. Having graduated from Red Music Academy in 2013, Nic “Pleasure Cruiser” Liu found himself proofreading artist interviews for Tokyo Digital Music Syndicates‘ now defunct Wasabeat digital download music store. Amongst those many interviews two stood out; one was with Soichi Terada and the other with Keita Sano. After being told by fellow office colleagues that it would be ‘muzukashii’ to meet up with Keita (let alone book him for a gig), Cruiser persisted to message the Okayama-hailed producer regularly on Facebook and receiving the odd response.

Eventually, summer came and gave Cruiser the chance to see Keita play at Oppa La, a high-rise venue in Fujisawa just south of Tokyo that has hosted respected names such as DJ Nobu, KZA & Force of Nature. The day involved drinking beers, munching on the club’s Japanese curry and dancing to Ray Mang‘s effortless weave of house, disco and techno. With the sun beginning to set things turned psychedelic. As Cruiser watched the sea peacefully lap the shore with his friend Raul, he spotted a fellow foreigner. Jokingly trying to work out why the ‘English language tutor’ would be hanging out here, on closer inspection it became clear that this was none other than the Prins Thomas. The Norwegian space-disco wizard was standing next to Kenji Takimi who was about to sign Keita to his label Rett I Fletta. Continue reading →