The wholesome story of how a 12-year-old ended up directing an Aphex Twin video
For many millennial music fans who missed out on Warp Records’ 1990s heyday, it’s likely the name Aphex Twin was first stumbled upon by hearing of the two groundbreaking music videos by Chris Cunningham.
Wrapped in notoriety and forever celebrated as some of the greatest promos ever, ‘Come to Daddy’s Thamesmead schoolkid horror and ‘Windowlicker’s surrealist hip-hop pastiche eventually pull intrepid young minds to the brains behind the sounds Richard D James’ body of work, yielding an entire world of inventive electronica and stirring ambient conjurings across the Aphex Twin moniker and surrounding multiple aliases.
Yet, a good while passed before the music world was treated to another official video, nearly two decades in fact. There had been a smattering of film projects after 1999’s ‘Windowlicker’, Cunningham’s experimental shorts ‘Monkey Drummer’ and ‘Rubber Johnny’ scored by old Aphex Twin tracks and Drukqs’ ‘Nannou’ dusted off for a later visual accompaniment in 2005, but a new gripping video to promote a single wasn’t to be found, James busy with his AFX Analord series and other pursuits in the interim.
During this time, one Irish YouTuber was busying himself with cutting homemade, amateur videos to his beloved Aphex Twin tunes. Having been uploading fan videos as well as video game content on his ‘epic1:40d Gaming’ channel, the autistic and visually impaired pre-teen Ryan Wyer caught the attention of James after his DIY video for Syro’s ‘minipops 67 [120.2][source field mix]’ went viral, prompting James to comment positively on his various YouTube uploads.
It turned out that Aphex Twin was gearing up to drop a new release, 2016’s Cheetah. In the run-up, Warp sent Wyer an email requesting his video services, sending an advance of all seven of the EP’s tracks and essentially told him to cut whatever promo he wanted.
Selecting the eight-minute ‘CIRKLON3 [Колхозная mix]’, Wyer set to task corralling friends and family in the County Dublin Rush area to all dance and lark about in front of the camera, donning the signature Aphex Twin grinning masks.
Shot on a smartphone, edited on Windows Live Movie Maker, and caked in lo-fi effects filters, ‘CIRKLON3 [Колхозная mix]’ was officially released in June 2016, proudly displaying Wyer’s directorial credits, and even displayed on a giant screen in Tokyo as part of its global marketing campaign.
To this day, the video has racked up over 3.3million views and helped cement comradeship between him and James, the two allegedly known to record shop together, prompting Wyer to opt for the name ‘Richard’ as part of his church confirmation.
“It’s really amazing, no one gets how music is Ryan’s passion, even though it’s a bit crazy what he listens to,” Wyer’s mother, Marie, revealed on a Facebook post. “Kids give him such a hard time, but he’s always persisted with what he likes. It’s good to be different; you don’t always have to fit in and do what others want you to do… All the trips to Tower Records for your crazy CDs have paid off.”
