BISK Moonstruck parade

Description

Cybernetical jazz crossed with hip-hop, IDM, and lighthearted '60s pop, Moonstruck Parade could only have come out of Japan. Disappointing to some, Bisk's fourth full-length covered a lot of familiar territory, not least recalling 1998's Ticklish Matters for its application of cut-up schoolyard techno and surprisingly listenable loop abstraction. Nevertheless, fans of Kid Loco and Fila Brazillia, or even Gorky's Zygotic Mynci, would probably find this to be Bisk's most cohesive work. 'Miss Lizzie' was comprised of synthesized birdcalls put to a chuggy lounge beat. The title track took juvenile gabba structures (shorn of noise) and coupled them with ultra-repetitive samples; disjointed, interweaved squalls of Casio; and the irony of the Moog Cookbook, while 'Shelly Crade' was a David Shire noir soundtrack interpreted by robots. Better than it had any right to be, clearly. ~ Dean Carlson Bisk: Naohiro Fujikawa. Alternative Press (3/01, p.80) - 4 out of 5 - '...A sublimely disorienting, cubist/electronic fusion of avant jazz and hip hop....some of the freshest, most rhythmically advanced music extant...' The Wire (1/01, p.71) - '...Samples of the post-war American soundscape....[It] has a strong sense of early 90s Gang Starr....ending up sounding like a Coldcut project circa 1991.'