Episome CD

Japanese avant-garde guitar improviser Otomo Yoshihide's performances span Zen-like harmonics dropped into long silences, and noisy pyrotechnic workouts. Most of EPISODE falls into the latter category, with the guitarist's partners, bassist Bill Laswell and the Ruins' drummer Yoshida Tatsuya, contributing wildly inventive electronic textures and percussive punctuation in a series of energetic displays of sonic abandon. There's always method to Otomo's madness, though, and his intelligently placed pauses ensure that his more thunderous flights of fancy are brought into sharp relief.

Photographer: Kenji Suzuki.

Personnel: Otomo Yoshihide (vocals, guitar); Otomo Yoshihide; Bill Laswell (bass guitar); Tatsuya Yoshida (drums).

Recording information: Orange Music, NJ (12/2005).