Kid Spatula - Joozy (2025)

We’re excited to announce that Kid Spatula returns after 20 years with a new full length LP for Third Kind. This comes after an incredibly creative streak from Mike Paradinas (aka µ-Ziq, Tusken Raiders, Jake Slazenger and Planet Mu label boss) that began in 2021 with arguably some of his best albums yet, such as ‘Scurlage’, ‘Magic Pony Ride’, ‘1977’ and ‘Grush’.

Opening and closing with the kind of spooky funk that only Mike P can produce, Joozy takes many twists and turns all within this artist’s unique sound world, embracing the more groovy laidback beats and sounds of his pre-‘Lunatic Harness’ era, with nods to his classic Kid Spatula and Jake Slazenger jams as well as hints of some of his more recent footwork and ambient adjacent work.

There is a feeling throughout of innocent adventure. Without ever sounding truly retro the album somehow evokes for me a certain nostalgia for long lost summers and riding a BMX with a Walkman on. There are melodies that gently reveal themselves, as if floating out from perhaps a better time, part 70’s jazz fusion, part 80’s TV themes. Then there are the full blown ear-worms like the bubbling soda stream shuffle of ‘Lichtblau’ or the somehow pastoral kosmiche of ‘On The Green’ - the spirit of Raymond Scott’s fun experimental electronic music every bit as present here as original 90’s IDM bedroom producers.

Elsewhere there are gothic organs and steam-powered mechanical beats that trace an aesthetic line all the way back to ‘Tango N Vectif’, whilst the carnival-esque ‘Casablanca’ and footwork-paced ‘Darth Vader’ boast warm haunting chordal shapes with aching melodies that pick up where recent µ-Ziq album ‘Grush’ left off.