This came out in 2000 — or at least that’s when I got it. Here’s what I said about it back then (with some minor editing):
DJs these days tend to paint by the numbers — a foundation of hip-hop beats and funky bass, a dab or two of sampling, some scratches for texture et voila!; another dance-floor still-life.
In comparison, Montreal mixmaster Kid Koala is the Picasso of plate-spinners, a talented abstract artist always pushing the envelope. Case in point: His long-awaited full-length debut Carpal Tunnel Syndrome, a wonderfuly skewed, brilliantly innovative affair. Less a composer than a pop artist whose medium is sound, Koala (born Eric San) stitches together the weirdest elements in the weirdest way possible. Freaky samples (like, say, lines from Revenge Of The Nerds) pop up like stream-of-consciousness thought balloons. Quirky hip-hop and jazz beats slow, speed, stop and start willy-nilly. sometimes songs are abandoned totally to showcase the Kid’s mind-blowing, Eddie Van Halen-level stylus skills, which he uses to create rhythms, melodies and even gibberish vocals like the adults in Peanuts cartoons. With limitless powers and enough playful audacity to make Fatboy Slim look like a Quaker, Kid Koala has painted a masterpiece.
