Cibo Matto: Stereo Type A : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

Japanese girl groups like Shonen Knife and Pizzicato Five are usually rock's novelty toys -- harmless, musically simplistic, campily naive. But Cibo Matto have always been more levelheaded and masterful than their musical sisters, and this busy, funky, self-assured second full-length album is nobody's exotic joke. The ironic ghost of ambient faux lounge (as found all over their debut, Viva! La Woman) lingers only in the sparkling marimbas and wah-wah horns of "Stone" and the strutting, confident "Flowers," with its sharp Latin elbows. Spanish guitar also gyrates in the corners of the ambling "Moonchild"; "Spoon," which sounded startlingly mature on the remix CD Super Relax, fits right in here with its jitters and swirls. "Sci-Fi Wasabi" and "King of Silence" share big, stagy horns: One trafficks in Beasties-worthy galactica, and the other, like many of the songs built on shimmering, suspended chords and off-kilter space beats ("Speechless," "Working for Vacation"), sounds like Air in a foul mood. (RS 815)

ARION BERGER