“I’m just some irritating, lying, ginger kid from Cornwall, who should have been locked up in some youth detention center. I just managed to escape and blag it into music.”
– Richard David James

And what a successful escape it was for techno DJ Richard David James, alias Aphex Twin, which is just one of his many pseudonyms. Richard is seen as the most inventive and influential figure in contemporary music, but also as one of the most elusive ones.

written by Laura Graat and Renee Schmeetz

His trademark, the ‘demon-face’, brought him to fame after the release of Windowlicker and still flashes up on screens during his live shows. Popular since the early nineties, some might argue that he’s starting to look like a one-trick pony. But worthy successors still have to be found. This allows him to be creative in his very own stubborn way, which might just include surprising his fans with a nineties hard core rave set during Lowlands, 2011.

Being as unpredictable as he is he doesn’t mind showing up late for a show. Or not showing up at all. And like a true narcissist, he jumps on every possible opportunity to spread his demonic trademark. Back in the day, people accused Black Sabbath of sneaking satanic messages into their music which could only be heard by playing it backwards.

Aphex Twin takes this phenomenon to a whole new egocentric level: When viewing Windowlicker’s soundwaves in a spectrogram, it reveals James’ face. An iconic image hidden in sound.

His body of work might give the illusion that he’s in love with his own grandeur, but those paying attention may also discover social commentary. Aphex Twin is not afraid of making fun of sexist stereotypes in mainstream R&B and rap videos. In live sets he might surprise the audience with a caricature of Dutch figureheads from the current politics using his face-mapping technique. Or he mocks some of the cheesy icons produced by popular culture from the past. He might even scare you by projecting his face onto yours on a life-size screen…If you’re lucky.

Saturday, November 26, Aphex Twin will play at the art and technology festival STRP in Eindhoven, which takes place from November 18 until 27. The Klokgebouw venue, which used to be an old Philips factory and cradle of electronic music, has recently been acoustically refurbished. These industrial halls hold no creative boundaries for Aphex Twin to offer an ultimate mix of visual art, music and technology.

Ticket pre-sales start on September 10 at 10 a.m. on theAphex Twin