Pochakaite Malko

Japan avant-prog outfit Pochakaite Malko shaped like a quintet in Tokyo in 1996, and presented bassist Shigekazu Kuwahara and keyboardist Kazuo Ogino. Kuwahara have been an associate of drummer Tatsuya Yoshida’s Magma-influenced group Koenji Hyakkei, showing up within the 1994 recording A Hundred Places of Koenji, and in 1995 used Ogino inside a Magma tribute music group led by Yoshida. Pochakaite Malko underwent several lineup changes within their first couple of years, and also a hiatus as Ogino became a member of Masaki Batoh’s psyched-out Ghost, but re-formed in Dec of 1999, this time around offering Kuwahara and Ogino alongside second keyboardist Tomohiro Ueno and drummer Junzo Tateiwa — another keyboardist, Sharmin, was also an associate of the group, but departed in 2000. In Dec 2000, the quartet of Kuwahara, Ogino, Ueno, and Tateiwa performed the music of Zamla Mammaz Manna with multifaceted Swedish avant-prog designer Lars Hollmer during among Hollmer’s Tokyo trips, and in springtime of 2001 Pochakaite Malko started focus on their eponymous debut recording, which saw launch in November of this yr. The quartet got inspiration from traditional ’70s-period keyboard-oriented intensifying rockers like Emerson, Lake & Palmer while incorporating affects from such Western european avant-proggers as Univers No, Present, and Magma — the last mentioned particularly unsurprising provided Kuwahara’s previous participation in Koenji Hyakkei and, alongside Ogino, in Yoshida’s Magma tribute music group. Pochakaite Malko also included a visitor appearance from guitarist Kei Fushimi using one monitor. Keyboardist Ueno still left the group immediately after the release from the debut Compact disc, nevertheless, but was changed by violinist Akihisa Tsuboy in the group KBB. Tsuboy performed a prominent function in Pochakaite Malko’s following record, Laya, released in November of 2004; the record maintained the debut’s energy but additionally more prominently shown globe fusion affects and organic characteristics. Tsuboy’s violin maintained its leading function within the 2006 Döppelganger EP, as the globe music aspects had been somewhat downplayed and only heavy and generating zeuhl fusion. While no more recordings had been forthcoming from Pochakaite Malko, the bandmembers possess stayed active in a number of various other projects. Tsuboy continued to be an associate of KBB; Kazuo Ogino provides continued to execute and record within the orbit of Masaki Batoh; and Tateiwa provides — furthermore to dealing with Batoh and firm alongside Ogino — performed percussion in several globe fusion groups. In the meantime, Kuwahara rebooted another of his personal rings, Zletovsko, which he previously started in 2002 with keyboardist Isao Horikoshi but got never documented; Zletovsko is really a crazy avant-prog quartet that in its most recent incarnation rejoins bassist Kuwahara with drummer Tatsuya Yoshida, and in addition contains Kei Fushimi, the guitarist who guested on Pochakaite Malko’s debut (and who, incidentally, alongside Yoshida, was an associate of SOLA, Lars Hollmer’s Global House Project).