OBA MASAHIRO: Prot (Symbolic Interaction)

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Posted on Jan 21st 2009 01:32 am

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Oba Masahiro: Prot

OBA MASAHIRO
Prot
PGT04
Symbolic Interaction 2008
09 Tracks. 45mins39secs

Staunch pastiche’s accrue in Oba Masahiro’s debut effort Prot and swiftly erode, enabling him to build out from a zero point with renewed vitality.  A grating swirl of heavily processed sound surfaces at first, with keyboard and percussion putatively detectable in the mix, occasional sunbursts of cymbal breaking through.  Masahiro then bleaches and reduces the same basic palette in a long, breezy susurrus that seems to have no obvious limits or durational boundaries; you’re just a part of it and then it’s over.  And when it is, there’s a surprise, since the ensuing work begins under a grey sky where piano notes unravel and spool on the floor in a tinkling heap.

Masahiro continues to explore this vein, Flit giving the piano chords an amniotic cushion of digital echo while Oeil suspends his lines in a clanging tank of whale-like moaning.  Such variation can be seen as a conscious effort on the part of Masahiro to prevent the work from being lumped in with any of the fads surrounding the warmer sides of experimental electronica.  He deserves stronger approbation, however, as the music enticingly bypasses disturbance and reestablished balance and achieves a constant state of renewal.

It’s abrupt adjustments are thus calm, without an end in sight, and yet of a certain rigorous necessity.  After the segment of sparse piano, the music remains full of unexpected dynamic shifts and resonances, from the powdery dryness of minimal clicks and spurts to the strong though muffled beats of an absent party.  On the evidence of these pieces, Masahiro appears as a source of a unique and endlessly interesting musical approach.

3.7/5

Icon: arrow Oba Masahiro (MySpace) | Symbolic Interaction

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