Kiss Your Friends. No Ninja Am I

Kiss Your Friends is an album in which No Ninja Am I, once again, captured sheer beauty in digits. Between the home family recordings at its start and at the end No Ninja Am I takes its listeners on a musical trip that takes them all the way to Laurel Canyon in the early 1970s, as if times haven't changed since.

We hear a child say "wakker worden" (wake up) at the beginning and the end of the record. The question I remain with is, is Sander van Munster dreaming in between the two points of reference. It seems like it, as Kiss Your Friends is an album with a dreamlike quality. (This state includes the album art, obviously.) It starts with the title track and it is sheer beauty, there's no other word for it. Van Munster taps even deeper into his inner Crosby Stills and Nash and finds some The Beatles there as well, as the rest of the album shows in abundance.

No Ninja Am I is one of the vehicles he makes music under, Showdog, De Breek are others, but I opt to see No Ninja Am I as his main one. Here he works mainly on his own to produce perfect pop songs, with help from friends who may sing a harmony vocal, add a trompet, viola or flute, the rest is Van Munster you hear.

Since I got acquainted with No Ninja Am I, the music progressed from somewhat electronic pop to 70s pop on 'Plenty Of Blankets' (2022). With Kiss Your Friends this switch is taken next level. There is clearly a desire to tap into the level of the perfect pop song. With '1969', the 'Woodstock' and CSN(&Y) breakthrough year, No Ninja Am I moves totally into Mountaineer territory. Both bands have a 'De Nieuwe Anita' connection as well. Although in some songs others sing with Van Munster, we mostly hear him harmonise with himself. That makes it the more baffling that he reaches that level of expertise in singing harmonies with CSN star quality.

With Kiss Your Friends No Ninja Am I has made an album that serves you the option to just lie down, close your eyes and listen to every single nuance in the music. You will discover so many, I promise you. Kiss Your Friends is an album to submerge in and totally undergo. It is an album that will get under your skin and not let you go. Pure by the power of soft pop songs that only get better with each spin.

Previous album 'Power Of Blankets' was nice, no doubt about it, but with Kiss Your Friends No Ninja Am I has crossed a line, one that ought to make it a household name in the western world. Believe me, it is this good. Perfection if I ever heard it. So yes, the whole album is the dream in between the two "wakker worden" sequences on this album.

Wout de Natris - van der Borght

You can listen to and order Kiss Your Friends here:

https://noninjaami.bandcamp.com/album/kiss-your-friends