Raw

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).