Once (Single Mix) / Formosa (Single Mix) [7"]

IROIRO - Once (Single Mix) / Formosa (Single Mix) [7"]

IROIRO's debut single gives you the feeling that anything's possible. The loping, chiming rock of “Once” morphs into an elegantly distorted whorl. “Formosa” boasts arena-rock swagger tempered by artfully noisy, psychedelic sensibilities and a wistful tunefulness. IROIRO understand that beauty paradoxically intensifies when chaos enters the frame.It only took a few gigs for IROIRO to establish themselves as Seattle's most exciting rock group. This may surprise fans of IQU, whose Michiko Swiggs and Kento Oiwa form IROIRO's creative core. Whereas IQU combined samples and live instrumentation to put playful spins on trip-hop, drum & bass, and synth-pop, IROIRO produce extended, vocal-free jams that blossom into powerful psychedelic rock. You can hear the band's rapid, splendid evolution on “Once”/“Formosa,” recorded in the '70s room at Avast! with Stuart Hallerman and mixed with vintage equipment, and side B recorded with David Farrell at Arrival Seattle. IROIRO share a parallel with another Seattle artist: Shabazz Palaces. Both auteurs came back from extended hiatuses to create their most adventurous music. After the disbanding of synth sorceress Swiggs and drummer Justin Schwartz's electronic unit Zazaz, they asked Oiwa to join them in a new project. Kento—who'd been involved in Malaise, his solo outlet for guitar and Theremin improvisation—agreed. The resulting single will convince you that rock still has ingenuity to burn. “We would sit around for hours and make sounds that we weren’t hearing from other music, or taking small inspirations from performances we liked and throwing them in,” Swiggs recalled. James Drage—formerly of SIL2K—joined the sessions and his effected bass sounds were, says Swiggs, “amazing and otherworldly. He was the perfect piece that we were missing in the band.”