Yoko K. (http://cdbaby.com/cd/yokok) will take you to another state of existence. She's a one-woman orchestra of transcendent electronic landscapes, producing wave after wave of trippy, synthesized textures.
However, beneath the chilly exterior of her beats is a vibrant human pulse. You get the impression that Yoko is expressing her emotions with these stream-of-consciousness rhythms; in fact, it's almost like a futuristic makeover of classical music as tempos change to reflect a shift in mood. The title cut, for example, gradually picks up steam, creating an increasingly disorienting effect with its trippy electronics.
On "Yoake," Yoko injects her own disembodied, dreamy voice to offer a poetic, cinematic narrative about "waiting for the misty sunrise." It's the perfect soundtrack for club goers coming home - or should that be coming down? - after an all-night rave. "Yoake" is a prime example of how Yoko hovers above her contemporaries in this genre. She takes it a step further, putting as much thought and feeling into each track as possible.
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Yoko steers from predictability as much as possible. In an electronica world rife with cookie-cutter clones, Yoko expresses intoxicating originality, mixing traditional Oriental flavors with ghostly vocals in the mournful "Mimi's Heart Muted" and singing in French on "La Complainte d'R2" with added trumpet and tumbling percussion.
This is truly the work of a visionary, a woman that I'm sure we'll be hearing more about soon.
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