Magic Thread

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Leaf continue to illustrate the other side of Susumu Yokota - the onetime Japanese economist, better known for funky house music across numerous combinations of record label and pseudonym - who, along with Nobukazu Takemura, is also releasing some of the most beautiful ambient music I've ever heard. "Magic Thread" has been out before, as an extremely rare Skintone release in Japan, actually pre-"Image 1983-1998" (last year's initial Yokota re-release), though "Image's" attractively sketchy impressionistic feel is surpassed here, with a more fully-worked electronic sound. The first piece, "Weave", is actually more gorgeous than anything on "Image...": a richly textured soundscape of drifting, clicking, pulsing, delicately looped melodies. Its fractured beauty evokes Takemura at his most restrained and blissful - both he and Yokota are seemingly capable of effortlessly producing truly sublime sounds, and its to their immense credit that this aspect of their work is rendered ever more seductive by their wider repertoire. Despite the electronics, there are some typically lovely traditional percussive sounds and plucked guitars, providing lattice frames for the Rhodes-like keyboard drops which both he and Takemura favour so much - dropped into the mix and then copied, pasted, sliced and diced. Yokota talks of attempting to attain the drifting intangibility of memories with his music, and listening closely enough, you do begin to inhabit the spaces in his compositions. Even false memories emerge, like a lonesome dérive through a nighttime Tokyo, cocooned in headphones, lulled by a dance of neon. This overwhelming sense of immersion is punctuated by a subtly insistent rhythmic drive - never overplayed or obvious, and certainly nothing approaching the dancefloor intensity of his previously better known work - but gently ambient rhythmic thuds emerging and disappearing almost imperceptibly. There's some exciting future projects for Yokota (and Leaf) - a 4-track EP of deep house remixes of "Image", and the third album in the Skintone series, "Sakura", as well as contributing to the forthcoming "Invisible Soundtracks: Macro 3", and releasing his first ever mix album on Skintone, using only tracks from the Leaf Label. Major props to both parties for developing such a fruitful partnership - us listeners have a lot to thank them for.