The turntablist movement produced all types of characters—introspective mystery men like DJ Shadow, alien beings like DJ Qbert, and armies of vinyl-shattering beasts like The X-Ecutioners. As a product of hip-hop, turntablists carried with them the bravado that’s inherent in the genre’s elements, like rhyming words with your own name or writing it in massive letters on a wall.There was one man in this global movement who didn’t swagger, whose music swapped machismo for endearment, and, interestingly, he may be the most skilled turntablist of them all. And that’s not hyperbole. While every other DJ in the world was scratching faster, Kid Koala was experimenting with the basics, truly making turntables into instruments by playing melodies with his hands and creating rich, layered compositions with nothing but a pair of decks and a mixer. His work was never about speed. It was about craft.But his deviation from the standard image of a DJ in the late 90s didn’t leave him devoid of imagery. On that front, Koala went his own route. Being a cartoonist, he created all his own album covers, each of his early sleeves a minimal but meaningful pencil sketch. This later developed into the creation of charming little characters that were central to his graphic novels, beginning with 2003’s Nufonia Must Fall. This was a far cry from what other turntablists were up to at the time. It was crafted impeccably and displayed immense skill, but there was another element to it—a word that hip-hop heads don’t often utter. It was cute.Read the rest over at The Creators Project.