Touching Extremes (IT)

Moskitoo is Sanae Yamasaki from Sapporo, Japan and Drape is her first release. The girl sings and puts her hands on various things – guitar, metallophone, organ, drum machine, synths and “nostalgic toy instruments” – but classifying her music does not come easy at all. You can find several characteristics of that particularly naive kind of expression that’s typical of many Japanese post-pop soundscapers, including whispered vocals (which, to be honest, is the only element that I don’t really like). But the arrangements are full of quirky turns and unexpected surprises, catching my attention several times over the course of the album. Imagine a mix of Eno, Residents and Art Of Noise played by a class of young computer freaks who find pleasure in adding beeps, chirps and tiny squelches to relatively simple rhythmical structures. Some of these juxtapositions work very well, creating a sense of dreamy suspension that just waits for a couple of ironic touches to be reduced into droplets of kitsch decadence, while at various points the adjacent lines behave like different individuals singing in proximity but without reciprocal hearing, so that everything becomes quite warped but never antagonistic to these ears. A nice outing, with a pinch of innocence that makes me appreciate it beyond its pretty appearance.