Spots

Moving freely through time and space via experimental DIY recordings since 2009, Joasihno return with their fourth album Spots. Southern German experimental pop duo Joasihno - initial solo founder Cico Beck (The Notwist, Aloa Input, Spirit Fest) and drummer/composer Nico Sierig (Instrument, Fehler Kuti) - seem to know exactly when it's time to shine. Idiosyncratic genre tweakers since day one, they have been operating at their own pace, mostly staying in their own shady corner. Yet, almost a decade after their most recent Meshes (N 047CD), it's high time for them to take over more corners, to reclaim even more spots between lo-fi and sci-fi, retro electronica and contemporary classic. Drawing upon influences as varied as Reich, Riley, Ryuichi, múm, Meek, and Moondog, while also nodding to other experimental twosomes (e.g. The Books), the duo's fourth full-length Spots arrives via Alien Transistor. Electronic shapes align and things lift off - with a majestic 8-bit sunrise soon appearing right in front of the listener. Whereas playful title song "Spots" is a miniature Rube Goldberg kind of device, with quirky plucked strings and glitches setting off more and more contraption layers, "Crackleboom" is uncharted energy, an open landscape, an expanding bonfire that leads to a long-forgotten piano, all dust-covered in some kind of saloon. Things break and shatter in the distance, but this spot right here is for hypnosis, dancing, sylvan spirits. And yeah, it's surprisingly hot down here in the undergrowth. It's all DIY spots, spots that leave room to dream or dangle, drape yourself over or dive into. Returning to the leafy bower on a melancholy post rock tip, we eventually learn that "Death Is Real" - and so the listener is left with a laterna magica that turns and turns and turns. It's a beautiful spot where light and shadows keep on dancing, just like they've always done, ever since the dawn of this madcap universe.