Bleep

There’s that ominous black dot again — and is it just us, or is it getting closer? Prolific vibraphonist Masayoshi Fujita has a way of transforming an instrument usually associated with placid jazz and Reichian minimalism into a machine of electronic-like, glitchy embellishments, and Bird Ambience is yet another leg of his journey exploring his intimate relationship with his tool of choice. The likes of ‘Morocco’ and ‘Pons’ bring the word ‘ambient’ to mind, but the stuttering textures of the title track and the ragged noise production of ‘Gaia’ suggest a composer interested in breaking hypnotic states every time he strikes a tone.