Last week, Kyle John Kenowski—a self-described “classical psychedelic folk pop musician and animator”—released an album called Need Disease. The record’s arrival also coincided with the release of a new music video for Kenowski’s single, “TRUSTWORMY.” The animated video, which premiered on Adult Swim Smalls on November 19, is the product of more than two years and “well over 2,000 hours” of work Kenowski put into the project. Fortunately, the time and effort are absolutely worth it, as “TRUSTWORMY” makes a strong case for being the best Milwaukee music video in 2020…not to mention one of the most ambitious Milwaukee music videos in recent memory.
Kenowski tells Milwaukee Record the video is a play on the biblical story of Adam and Eve. Though he says he doesn’t subscribe to any traditional religion, he finds beauty in the story of creation.
“For me, that story is a statement on the belief that knowledge of right and wrong instills in us moral responsibility,” Kenowski says. “A blessing and a curse, but as the work deviates from that initial concept, for me, it becomes an observation of seduction, deception, fear, death, aesthetics, and the idea that life itself is sustained by digesting the same material reality that it itself is made out of.”
While he certainly has reason to be proud of the “TRUSTWORMY” music video (which has garnered close to 20,000 views at the time this article was written), Kenowski sees the visual rendering as a “billboard” for his full-length record, which he considers to be the more significant work. Check out the video, listen to Need Disease in its entirety, and subscribe to Kenowski’s Patreon page to get access to more artful music and astounding animation.