Most people's knowledge of Japanese music involves polar extremes -- the bombastic, glitter-splattered, media-blitzed world of J-Rock and the hushed, reverent tones of traditional Japanese folk music. It's hard to blame them for having such gaping holes in their knowledge, especially as the vast majority of it was culled from television and cinema. And besides, if they dug deeper, the music they'd discover -- perhaps the gargantuan heaviness of Acid Mother's Temple, or the cutesy-wootsy pop of Takako Minekawa -- might be too tough for them to stomach. Interstellar sextet Ghost are slightly easier to digest, as they bridge the gap between the traditional hymns of their youth and the feedback-drenched super-rock peddled by legions of their countrymen.
Masaki Batoh and Ghost have been away for the better part of five years, but not much has changed during their hiatus; they still reside on a modest compound somewhere in the Japanese countryside, and their main inspiration continues to occur when they're sitting on a hill, bong close at hand, staring into the sun until everything goes elliptical and neon black. Hypnotic Underworld is as sufficiently subterranean as anything in their arsenal: murky contrabass figures slither through swamp-basted guitars, dreamy piano and the odd tin whistle, lute or Celtic harp on their way towards an undeniably sludgy underbelly. It's rock and roll besieged on all sides by overwhelming tradition, yet there's something defiantly modern bubbling up beneath the whole roiling brew.
The bashing power-chords of "Aramaic Barbarous Dawn" ebb into a cascade of celestial voice, something akin to Blue Cheer backed by a choir of angels. "Hazy Paradise" is exactly that, a gleaming, guitar-driven slice of backpedaling psychedelia that sounds like a perfect sunset, while "Piper" begins life as a pastorally lovely tune, then morphs into a terse blast of golden-tipped classic rock, and the confusing and confounding "Kiseichukan Nite" is enough to convince you to break in your hare Kari dagger. The lumbering, four-part title-track is another beast entirely -- a contemptuous tug-of-war between tradition and technology. There are no clear battle lines drawn, and no clear victor once the dust clears, but damned if it's not brilliant to lean back and listen to the carnage.
Even the funky "Ganagmanag" is imbued with an almost overpowering sense of Eastern convention. While that's not a flaw per se, the custom-based confusion inherent throughout Hypnotic Underworld's sinewy grooves occasionally becomes overwhelming; the music is fantastic, but the sinking suspicion that there's something else going on that you can't possibly fathom becomes pervasive by album's end. Still, from a purely musical perspective, the disc delivers in spades, even if its spiritual ramifications are completely lost in translation.
Essentially, Hypnotic Underworld is a back to basics affair for the tribe, a heavy-handed hello after a few years off the job -- no new fans won, none lost in the process. Meet the new bong, same as the old bong.
