Anyone who stepped from the frigid, grimy streets of New York's meatpacking district into Baktun, with its shimmery light and exposed brick walls, was in for a few hot blasts of incongruity. A dance club too crowded for anybody to dance. Top-shelf liquor served in plastic cups. A tiny performance space filled by a video screen, shiny microphone stands, and ancient-looking, beautifully appointed drums. Oh, and electronica DJs making music with members of the Japanese drum troupe Kodo. |

Kodo, world-famous for their zealous study and mastery of Japan's traditional drum art Taiko, were in town to support Sai-so, an album of remixes from their 1997 breakthrough Ibuki. Featuring remixes by DJ Krush, Strobe and Bill Laswell, the new album re-casts Kodo's intricate, shifting drum patterns into relentlessly danceable grooves. At Baktun, nobody in the cattle-packed crowd could walk, let alone dance, but once the performance began, it hardly mattered.

Dressed like urban hipsters, Kodo members launched into fantastically complex rhythms while keyboardist Metronome B. from Inteligente (one of the groups whose remix appears on Sai-so) draped oscillating sci-fi tones behind them. The pony-tailed Ryutaro Kaneko lit into his drum with a dowel-like stick while Hideyouki Saito clashed together two hand-held cymbals with astonishing articulation. Behind them, Yoshikazu Fujimoto -- looking very downtown in a long black leather trenchcoat -- swung what can aptly be described as the Louisville Slugger of drumsticks over his shoulder like a sledgehammer onto a massive kettle drum called the Hirado-Daiko, emitting a kick-drum belly punch that would put RZA and Lars Ulrich to shame. Together, sometimes with other drummers or flautist Motofumi Yamaguchi, the Kodo mini-troupe wove a dense yet fragile web of shifting accents that stoked the mass of bodies into whoops of excitement.

Kodo have always emphasized cultural exchange, so it was no surprise to hear interlocking Afro-Cuban and West African rhythms in the weave. As these carefully constructed rhythms built up the tension in the room, the audience was sucked into the whirlpool of music. Red and orange spotlights waxed incandescent over everyone. Pastel-colored video images of the drummers flickered on the screen behind them. Cymbal genius Hideyouki Saito turned around and began scraping the brick wall with his instrument, resembling Ralph Macchio in the Karate Kid's "Wax On, Wax Off" scene, and sending a whole new sound of metal on stone hurtling through the room. The rhythmic tension continued to build. Finally, at the inevitable point of release, the drummers leaned back, tossed their heads back and roared with pleasure. So did everybody else.

The drummers alternated sets with DJs Jason Jordan, Strobe and Kevin Yost, who spun propulsive breakbeats and quirky, lockstep house rhythms. If only there'd been room to dance.

RODD MCLEOD(March 9, 1999)