Plus-Tech Squeeze Box

Plus-Tech Squeeze Box are a Japanese electronic band, consisting of ハヤシベトモノリ(Tomonori Hayashibe), ワキヤタケシ (Takeshi Wakiya) formed in 1997. The frenetic kitchen-sink sound of their first album FAKEVOX (2000) is an example of the subgenre known as picopop, driven by rudimentary synthesized sounds and heavily-manipulated samples from a variety of sources. Junko Kamada provides vocals throughout the album. Their second album, CARTOOOM!, was released in 2004. Junko Kamada is conspicuously absent, having parted ways with the band. Instead, sampled vocals and a variety of guest singers are used. Their initial album, FAKEVOX contains a level of frenetic multi-composition rarely seen in any pop release, but maintains a pleasant arrangement of instrumental clips, sound-bytes and uniquely J-pop sounds which seem to miraculously avoid dissonance and remain quite interesting to listen to. Their second album, Cartooom! remains somewhat similar to FAKEVOX along the lines of the patchwork-quilt style composition, but albeit a much more frantic -- almost manic arrangement which may be somewhat less-accessible for your brain to sychronise with than their initial album. Regardless, there seem to now be several notable artists which borrow from this genre of pop, most notably The Go! Team.