www.misterridiculous.com
November 2001
by James Squeaky

A mostly solo album by Chicago´s Chiyoko Yoshida. She´s also in a band I´ve never heard of called Sweeder and has sung backing vocals on an impressive resume of other band´s albums. Her voice is expressive and haunting, perhaps in the same world as Cat Power (particularly the unlisted track 9) or Tori Amos (but without being lame, mind you). The instrumentation is lush but without upstaging Chiyoko´s heart-filled turtle-tail watching journeys.

At times the music is a little bit cutesy like "Bed Eyes" plinky guitar playing, at other times lo-fi and stylistic, the guitar playing on "Pleasure Diamond" sounding sorta like Bright Eyes. "Go On" is quite poppy and deserved of radio play for it´s scratching at the front door intermittent guitar riffs. A nice variety of styles and sounds from song to song making it an interesting treat. Something that my dad could probably enjoy, but still exciting enough that I can spin it a few more times yet.