Improvised Music from Japan, IMJ-522
Released on September 26, 2004
Purchase price in Japan: 2,000 yen (tax not included)
(For purchase outside of Japan, prices vary.)
Kato Hideki: electric bass and bass synthesizer
James Fei: oscillators, filters, spring reverb, contact mike, and miscellaneous electronics
Based in New York City since 1992, Kato Hideki--a former member of Otomo Yoshihide's group Ground-Zero and Tony Buck's band Peril--has been involved in myriad projects in America and Europe, including Fred Frith and Ikue Mori's Death Ambient, and a multimedia collaboration with Nicholas Collins. Taiwan-born James Fei studied with Alvin Lucier and Anthony Braxton following his move to the U.S. (also in '92). Now living in New York, he's active as a composer and improviser, and as an instructor at Columbia University's Computer Music Center. Fei is also a sax player, although he doesn't use the instrument on this album. In recent years, Kato and Fei have been performing as a duo at live music venues and galleries in New York. Sieves was made through a process of excerpting, editing, mixing, and mastering electronic performance and recording using feedback; live-performance-like analog mixes; and performance-recording of acoustic reverberation. Not limited to mere documentation and editing, the recording process was treated as a form of improvisation and composition.
