Durango native Cuatro Kruse is a lot of things. He’s a permaculture builder and a chocolate maker, a glass blower, archery coach and farmer. All those hobbies, skills and life pursuits also tie into what he may be best known for around these parts, and that’s as a musician.
Kruse, (the man who made the cob bench that sits in Buckley Park across from The Durango Herald offices), is in a life-long pursuit of learning, and learning music came first, dating back to the 1990s when his band Fresno Smoothie was disqualified from the Miller Middle School talent show because some kid decided to stage dive and wasn’t caught.
“In our eyes (that) made us win because we then were infamous,” he said.
Then in high school came The Randibles, a rowdy punk band that played skateboarding events and house parties on bills with older-in-age bands like The Thirteens.
Post Randibles he led reggae outfit A-Dub-Rock Band, the band Kruse refers to as “the funnest band I’ve ever been in.”
His love of punk and reggae went hand in hand, two socially conscious forms of music steeped in rebellion with a do-it-yourself mindset at its core.
“Punk rock fit us for the angsty teen-stage, getting out a lot of that energy, but my sister Gracie Bassie and I also grew up listening to reggae,” Kruse said. “I’ve always loved reggae music and punk rock music, I think for the same reasons. They have this message of righteous rebellion and a lot of political overtones and things I’m really interested in.”
Reggae, punk rock, farming, alternative energy sources and permaculture all tie into his latest musical project. Recording under the name FutureFolk, it’s an amalgamation of all his pursuits, interest and lifestyle all zipped into a musical package of weird folk, punk, hip-hop and reggae in an electronic music package.
He’s been developing these sounds since A-Dub-Rock Band called it quits, as Kruse has bounced around from South America to California to northern New Mexico to the Front Range. Learning self-sustaining, non-music skills, he’s had this music project percolating in his ever-active brain, with the pandemic kicking the project into high gear.
“It was a way I coped with the isolation,” Kruse said. “I’ve always loved ’80s music, I’ve always loved reggae music and roots reggae music. I also like electronic music and started to feel more drawn to European electro-dub and French artists. I bought my first synthesizer with a sequencer and started to learn how to make sounds from scratch on a synthesizer. And that became a healthy obsession to get me through COVID. It’s grown and grown into a massive sound machine I’ve built, so basically FutureFolk is a retro, futuristic kind of one-man looper band.”
This DIY, synth-heavy, reggae-rhythmed experimental dub sounds all are recorded via a solar power studio, so it’s only natural that it is void of any type of digital technology; it fits the overall mission.
“I don’t use any computers to record my music. I don’t have anything against it, but for me it's not as inspiring as when I can get my hands on actual knobs and faders,” he said. “It just gives it that kind of gritty, retro feel that I like. I like analog equipment.”
Since Kruse moved to a piece of land outside of Pagosa Springs, he’s been building a homestead and soon to be permaculture education center by day, recording music by night. Lots of music. As of now he’s got a handful of singles at the ready, with plans to drop an album on down the line.
“I probably have two or three hundred songs that I’ve started on that I’m now picking through and picking out the ones I want to focus on,” he said. “So, an album is in the future for sure.”
Bryant Liggett is a freelance writer and KDUR station manager. Reach him at liggett_b@fortlewis.edu.
