pop_and

Yui Onodera first attracted attention with work released on his
own Critical Path label in 2005. It wasn't too long after, that he
attracted the attention of Drone Records, and/OAR, Mystery
Sea, Taalem and Gears Of Sand (releases still forthcoming on
Mystery Sea and Gears Of Sand).

Suisei is a work composed from field recordings and pump
organ. Edited and re-mastered by Dale Lloyd.

With Suisei, each listener's inner cinema will find its camera
lens slowly panning and cross-fading from one enigmatic
location to another, as if unveiling ambiguous visual clues
pertaining to some wondrous culminating event that many
might not fully understand, yet it will still manage to leave an
indelible impression upon the subconscious mind and a very
subtle pull on the emotions. A mystery drone soundscape
journey along the shores of an unfathomable glistening sea...

Packaged in four color digipak.

"Suisei is a composition by Yui Onodera that I like very much.
Almost tactile like use drone material, a seeming mix of
environmental and instrumental sounds (water seems to be a
key element, and a pump organ is mentioned). The piece
builds slowly and inexorably, with a nice sense of pacing. We
might think it is over after about a half an hour but happily the
work continues even beyond. We never know where the
composer is leading us, but we are happy to find ourselves
there." (Carl Stone - composer and professor at Chukyo University)

"So far, one of my favourite discs of 2007, simply beautiful and
delicate, produced and designed by Dale Lloyd, one of his
(and/OAR) best yet." (Matthew Swiezynski - The Art Of Memory blog)

EARLABS (MARCH 2008)
Suisei describes a gradual movement along a horizontal plain,
hedged by field recordings and drones that are ever changing,
as multiple frequencies interact through the vertical laminates,
revealing a microtonal world simmering with low-key drama
and incident.

With past works already released on labels such as Mystery
Sea, this recording represents his most comprehensive and
cogent statement to date. A narrative is erected before one's
minds eye, one which knows how to capture one's desire in
anticipation of what might be revealed at the end. In this vein,
Onodera exploits the harmonic space to spread out chordal
shifts and inject mood and tension into pure, abstracted
soundworlds. Change and continuity are then united in his
carefully tending to the interplay of the field recordings with the
pump organ, as he patiently waits for the interaction to reach a
natural endpoint before gradually weaving in new elements as
the old die away in a wonderfully slow cross-fade.

Another part of his approach is to diligently explore a few
different aspects of one thing. This is then mixed with
incremental developments, which makes for a dream-like
environment, one in which the sounds assume a startling
physicality while at the same time seeming inexhaustible in
character.

The pacing is in keeping with this, moving smoothly as it does
from lulling to edgily ambiguous. The production is done with
delicacy and minimalist rigor, and as with a stick or rock, it's
consistent the entire way through. Indeed, that it is so well
organized in every regard only helps further the sense that all
of these pieces have emerged from a consistent and rigorous
aesthetic. (Max Schaefer)

THE WIRE (FEBRUARY 2008)
Suisei translates from the Japanese with a number of
meanings. It could be a comet, or the Japanese name for the
planet Mercury, or an adjective for "aquatic", particularly with
reference to the strength of a river current. In the case of Yui
Onodera's album, the watery metaphors apply. Sourced from
field recordings and pump organ, Suisei is a
meditative album which transitions effectively between humble
drips, wet smacks and lulling patter of water tumbling through
the landscape. Onodera doesn't pretend that his field
recording techniques enjoy the pristine fidelity of Chris Watson
or a Douglas Quin, rather his mottled sounds embrace the
abstraction produced through contact microphones and
consumer-grade dictation mics. Sustained drones from his
pump organ buttress the quiet hypnosis of these field
recordings, thanks to the instrument's woozy oscillations. The
organ's harmonics gradually swell as ghostly slippages of
sound descend gracefully into compressed wintry din and
aquatic percolations. (Jim Haynes)

AQUARIUS RECORDS (JANUARY 2008)
Not much information to present about who Yui Onodera is.
Nor is there anything in the way of a conceptual framework to
guide one through this album beyond its sources from
"environmental sound and pump organ." Not that it really
matters anyway, as Suisei is a gorgeous album of darkly
textured drones with parallels to Thomas Koner's isolationist
compositions or Keith Berry's precious deconstructions. Wind,
rain, and water all make themselves known in the collection of
field recordings, as does the pump organ, which reveals itself
in harmonic sustained tones with a spectral timbre (e.g.
Niblock, Radigue, Chalk, etc.). During a particular enigmatic
episode, wooden creaks and sodden groans duet with a
motorized persistant soft-grind, giving the impression that
some unscrupulous machine is quietly compacting sinews,
meat, and bone. Strangely, it never sounds macabre or
unsettlingly grotesque; rather, these crunching textures situate
humbly next to a hypnotic wash of compressed static and
melancholic shadowy drone, which sublimely shift into a
slippery crescendo of grey massed sound. Very, very well done!

TOUCHING EXTREMES (MAY 2008)
Sometimes I feel in dire trouble, cornered in the condition of
finding words to describe what is a relatively simple record that
nevertheless touches certain depths, which not many artists
can manage to, their display of technical prowess
notwithstanding. In the case of Yui Onodera, a clue was
reading the “special thanks” to Mystery Sea’s boss Daniel
Crokaert on the sleeve: where this man is found, the presence
of water is all but assured (and the Japanese artist has
releases out on that label, too - stay tuned). Indeed this album
is strongly based on different aquatic hues in various kinds of
sonic gradations and dripping intensity. Not only that, Onodera
also made good use of uncertainly definable “environmental
sounds” - apparently slightly treated, at least in well (in)
determinate foggier sections - and splendid ghostly
emergences of his pump organ, whose static chords enter the
picture in sparse appearances, like a detached narrator would
in a minimal theatre performance where the audience
understands what happens but somehow still appreciates to
be led amidst the subplots. The composer succeeds in
chipping the commonplace off the utilization of water as a
compositional means, an austere processing the key factor in
creating a natural path through which the piece slowly walks,
delivered from useless glittering clothes, extremely profound in
its almost religious concoction of deep-breath silent prayer
and severe concentration. Elemental innocence that doesn’t
promise an easy penetrability.. (Massimo Ricci)