Lackluster


Esa Ruoho, better known as Lackluster, is a Finnish electronic music producer and performer from Kontula, Helsinki. He is also known as Esa Ruoho, XLLV, Can'O'Lard and Kökö and the Köks.
Ruoho has lived most of his life in Helsinki, Finland, but has also, since 2000, travelled to Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada for six months in 2000–2001, and also spent time in Dublin, Ireland.

Musical career

Esa Ruoho started composing electronic music in the mid-1990s and, after 2000 has been releasing recorded music on many labels, full-length CDs on such labels as deFocus records, Merck Records, U-cover, Psychonavigation Records, New-Speak Records. He has since 2007 worked with SLSK Records from San Francisco and Nice And Nasty from Ireland, the San Francisco-based netlabel TwoCircles Records and the Argentinian netlabel Igloo-Rec, and the American label JellyFish Frequency Recordings.
Lackluster was formerly known as the chiptune musician, Distance, part of the demoscene groups Orange, Monotonik, Calodox, The Digital Artists, The Planet of Leather Moomins, FLO and Satori.
Esa also ran a Bulletin Board System, Cloudcity, from 1992 to 2000 – utilizing HectoBBS, SuperBBS and PCBoard BBS Software. The name Lackluster is taken from "Pyramids" by Terry Pratchett, encountered 1996–1997.

Collaborations

Esa has collaborated with Heikki Lindgren since 2018, forming a duo called HLER, creating fully improvised Ambient Drone music using a rare Peruvian monophonic synth, the Atomosynth Mochika XL.

Live performances

Since 2000, Ruoho has played numerous musical performances as Lackluster, Esa Ruoho and as a part of the ambient-drone duo HLER in Finland, Sweden, Norway, Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, Germany, France, Spain, Ireland, England, Austria, Poland, Russia, Latvia, Estonia, Bulgaria, Hungary, Lithuania and Ukraine. Current tally: 161 live performances.
Ruoho has also played as warm-up support for numerous famous electronic musicians, such as Biosphere, Petri Kuljuntausta, The Orb, Mixmaster Morris, Brothomstates, Aleksi Perälä/Astrobotnia/Ovuca, Cylob, Wevie Stonder, Machinedrum, Jimmy Edgar, Move D, Jimi Tenor and Bad Loop.

Discography