Album Review: Helena Espvall & Masaki Batoh

Old school pysch-lord and new folk chanteuse get weird

‘Overloaded Ark’’s press release comes with instructions, hand-typed from Japanese psych hero Masaki Batoh himself. “This album contains out of audio frequency band (1/3 octave band freq 1~80),” it goes. “don’t listen this album by mp3 for your criticism. This is not joke. You are facing his bleeding spirit.” Sorry Batoh, times are hard: it’s ipod or nothing… way less garage-freakazoid than Batoh’s Ghost material, ‘…Ark’ is still some trip, taking in various Euro covers along with a raft of self-composed material. Though a little too self-indulgent in places, it’s Espvall (of Espers) who ties it together, siphoning her cathartic Vashti Bunyan impression to eerily dramatic effect.

Matt Wilkinson

Click here to get your copy of Helena Espvall & Masaki Batoh’s ‘Overloaded Ark’ from the Rough Trade shop.

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