Synapse, “Peek-Ara-Boo” (Tzadik, 2)
Collaboration between two titans of the international avant-art-noise-rock-improv underground who also happen to be Japanese women – DNA-drummer-turned-electronic-percussion-polymath Ikue Mori and vocalist/found-sound-collagist Haco.
The Japanese echoes are clearest in some of Haco’s melodies and a certain use of space and silence, but it’s most reminiscent of (and seriously of comparable quality to) Eno’s “Another Green World” LP. It has the same quality of genuine ambience, i. e. creating a model of the random everyday world, but with all of its hidden depths and contrast brought into a breathtakingly sharp relief that has a certain unassuming magic about it.
Try 3, 4
3/18/18

Synapse, “Raw” (Tzadik, 2005)
Synapse is a project featuring Haco on vocals and samplers/keyboards and former DNA drummer Ikue Mori on electronic percussion. These women are among the giants of Japanese Fringe-avant-rock, and this is among their best work. It’s all breathtakingly inventive and fully realized, but the true astonishers are 3 (“Red And Green,” a peculiar, curling melody sung a capella by Haco, alternating with a ringing spiral-march of clamor, like a Phil Spector production from another dimension) and 4 (“Morning Song,” cacophony of a city waking up, then submerging and/or opening out into a warm, fluid hum-drone of perfect beauty and stillness).