The first duo album by Otomo Yoshihide (turntables) and Quentin Rollet (alto & sopranino saxes, electronics).
Quentin Rollet has known Otomo Yoshihide for some thirty years. He has followed his work, reviewed some of his albums for fanzines and magazines, and seen him perform numerous times.
Yet, until then, they had never played together.
The opportunity arose in Montreuil in November 2024, while Otomo Yoshihide was visiting France for a series of concerts. They met up at Les Instants Chavirés and recorded just over an hour of music. No rehearsals, no structure, no prior instructions: they simply started playing.
From this encounter emerges music that moves between noise art and lyricism—sometimes in succession, sometimes simultaneously. Listening to the recordings, Quentin Rollet found certain sounds evocative of birds and strange flying creatures. The tracks were given their titles accordingly: swallows, sparrows, starlings, crows, woodpeckers... before Gyaos, Ghidrah, Mothra, and Godzilla made their appearance.
The birds had met the kaijus. The album title was found: Flying Kaijus.
Founder of the historical group Ground Zero, guitarist, turntablist, composer, film score composer and record producer Otomo Yoshihide (born 1959 in Yokohama), a pioneering figure in the Electroacoustic Improvisation scene, is one of the most recognized artists in the Japanese experimental music scene. Spearheading a whole generation of musicians and particularly the Onkyo movement, his music defies all categories. The list of his collaborations is endless: Sachiko M,
Martin Tétreault, Günter Müller, Taku Sugimoto,
Christian Marclay,
eRikm, Keith Rowe,
Oren Ambarchi, Toshimaru Nakamura, Jon Rose,
John Zorn,
Bill Laswell,
Xavier Charles,
Luc Ferrari,
Derek Bailey,
Axel Dörner,
Tetsuo Furudate,
Jim O'Rourke,
Yasunao Tone,
Lasse Marhaug, Paal Nilssen-Love, Hijokaidan,
Roger Turner,
Evan Parker,
Keiji Haino,
Steve Beresford,
John Butcher,
Tony Buck,
Franz Hautzinger,
Noël Akchoté, etc.
Quentin Rollet (born 1974) started playing the alto saxophone at the age of 11 and the sopranino saxophone at 37. After a few years spent unlearning the teaching of the conservatory, he devoted himself solely to free improvisation. This led him to play on record or on stage with groups as varied as
Nurse With Wound, Prohibition, The Red Krayola, Mendelson,
David Grubbs, Herman Dune,
Akosh S. Unit,
Thierry Müller, Rubin Steiner,
eRikm,
Jac Berrocal,
Andrew Liles, Bästard, Ulan Bator,
Costes,
Red,
Melmac, Dragibus, Phoebe Killdeer & The Short Straws,
Jérôme Lorichon,
Charlie O, Dan-Charles Dahan, Zsolt Söres, Pal Toth, Jean-Noël Cognard, Jean-Pierre Barja, Rivkah, Benoît de Villeneuve...... He is a member of
Pointe du Lac, and the co-founder of the labels
Rectangle (with
Noël Akchoté),
reQords and
Bisou Records.
