By Greggory Moore
The band oto (scroll down a couple of stories for background) is a quartet, but only three members—Hiro, Boon, and Tai—live in the U.S. However, fourth member Takeshi is visiting from Japan this month to record and get in a few shows; and this night at Portfolio (a favorite performance space for oto) was the first.
These current shows are a rare chance to hear some of oto’s songs in fully-fleshed-out form, as Takeshi is the band’s primary vocalist (the Stateside trio generally eschew the vocals (the songs still work)); plus, his presence allows for dual keyboards/keyboard + xylophone when a song calls for it, as in his absence Tai can obviously do only one or the other (while Hiro plays guitar and Boon switches off between guitar and percussion).
oto is always very down to business: there’s no faux-witty stage banter, no attempts at “showmanship”; it’s just well-performed, elegant, airy music. The sound is always organic, from the human breath necessary to evoke sound from melodicas to the slap of Boon’s hands on the rattling box he uses for a stool. Takeshi’s presence led to more talk from the stage than ever—though from a band this lacking in garrulousness amounted to little more than mentions of their Websites and upcoming shows in San Diego (April 21 at Vinbladh’s, 4651 Park Blvd.) and Santa Ana (May 1 at the Gypsy Den, 125 N. Broadway).
For a couple of songs on this night they got a little extra help on percussion from friend Chris, who hosts a weekly Webcast radio show on KBEACH.org (Tuesdays 11 a.m.–1 p.m.; click on the “Listen Live” icon) and plugged the fact that he will be playing some oto this week.
As for oto themselves, do yourself a favor and go to www.otosound.net and/or myspace.com/otosound.