Eric Kowalski sort of nailed it with this one. Rather than decide to engage in the nearly pointless drum programming happening around the same time, he felt a better use of his efforts would be just making sweet songs with pounding beats.
You’d be hard pressed to call this “Dance Music” since it couldn’t exactly be expected to help anyone get up on the floor. Instead, you’re left with either songs that move too fast (Summer Clip) or go too slow (Aquarium).
“Summer Clip” is him at his best. Easily the highlight of the whole album, there’s multiple melodies multiplying off of each other, like early Autechre. Comparing this to Boards of Canada would be wrong, however. Unlike Tycho which has much more a blatant rip-off vibe, Casino Versus Japan is able to distinguish himself from a lot of the IDM. For one, the music doesn’t sound stale later (keep in mind this was released in 2002, during my last music addiction phase).
The short vignettes are probably why a BOC comparison gets brought up. Rather than keep them as interludes, shorts like “Moonlupe” and the beautiful closer “Trad Velecido” are fully fledged songs. It is a bit of a shame that this Wisconsin native never much more of this wonderful stuff.