The debut album by the young Lithuanian electronic music producer This Kid Here, initially planned as an EP, yet eventually turning out to be far longer than a standard EP would be, "Courses" is a weird and quirky introduction by the musician behind it. The tracks were started to work on with no intention for a release, yet in early 2014, the idea and title emerged in the head of This Kid Here. By that moment, the majority of songs that eventually ended up on the record had already been written, but the new found concept then started living its own life, and those songs were picked to match the concept. Only the last two songs were purportedly written for this record.


The name "Courses" and the concept were born while the artwork had been made- when the artwork, namely the cover photo, was being dealt with by the musician, he came up with the title, with no trace of ideas, where did it come from and what did it actually mean, yet then the title emerged into a concept and was adjusted to the feel of already recorded material. The concept itself is what could be described as perception of movement, the way things change, evolve and seeking your own way in life, music, art and so on. The cover photo depicts one of the places, where This Kid Here used to go by, and as he enjoys thinking up new music whilst commuting somewhere, everyday walks are a meaningful time. That is the first and initial meaning of "a course"- a rout. Other meanings are a course being a way of learning and a way of searching. We learn every day, never mind are we still at school, at college, at university, at our work, or are we simply wandering around, never mind, do we actually want to learn, or do we avoid it. And as the course, which used to lead This Kid Here to the place he studied changed over the time the EP was written, so did his life. And whilst writing his debut EP, he was still only starting to learn music theory, whose elements slowly crawl into new songs, enriching and embellishing them- that is yet another meaning of "a course". And no one prohibits you from thinking of your own personal meaning of it.


Musically, this EP, actually, is still teetering on the brink of amateurism, a sort of hard way to find your own voice. Another meaning of "Courses EP" is it being cyclic: the last song is the newest, yet the first two tracks, being the by far oldest of all, merely the first ever This Kid Here tunes, were re-worked the last, so it goes like a cycle- new-old-new-old-new-old. The re-worked tracks show some straightforward electronic music aspects, inspired mostly by Aphex Twin, Rustie and Autechre, while the following tunes show a different landscape- gentle synth and noisy guitars, inspired mostly by bands like R.E.M., MGMT, and Foals, the highlight of it all being strong basslines. Step by step, the musician goes further into the wilderness of sound. The second part of the record is all about experimentation, drawing inspiration from These New Puritans, MGMT, early Pink Floyd, Can, Gong, as well as Battles, Foals, it runs madly back and forth, by the way gathering new instruments and weird sounds. The lead single of the EP- "End Loop" is Autechre-, Battles- and These New Puritans-inspired, heavily dependent on percussion and samples. The last track finds its way through noisy samples, post rock chill, unforeseen drumming and minimal synthesizers towards a Tame Impala-inspired psychedelic synth pop part, showing an antithesis to the casual messed up sound, typical for This Kid Here throughout the record. Repetitive yet evoking, it suddenly smashes into a wall of almost-punk-rock guitar solo, before ending with fading delay.

So, here you will find a variety of sounds and genres, together forming a strange mess, that is perhaps the typical style of This Kid Here. Some call it electronic free jazz, but we may stick to experimental just for a while.