Downbeat: Erika Dohi “Myth of Tomorrow” Review
Phil Freeman gives Myth of Tomorrow a 4-star review in the February issue of Downbeat.
★★★★
"Keyboardist and vocalist Erika Dohi is constructing her own sonic world — into which she invites the rest of us from time to time. Her debut album, 2021’s I, Castorpollux, drifted by like a half-remembered dream, piano and synth melodies laying a foundation for wavering vocals, horn lines swaddled in reverb and echo, and pulsing rhythms that owed more to minimalist classical and early ’00s avant-garde electronic music than any type of jazz.
Myth Of Tomorrow is similar in some ways, but even more insular and introspective. Although the range of instruments is much wider — trumpet, flute and saxophone; traditional Japanese instruments like koto, taiko drums and various flutes; and several iconic/vintage synthesizers (Fairlight CMI, Oberheim) — it all feels like the product of one mind.
The first proper song, “Ame Onna,” is a kind of cybernetic art-pop, with Dohi’s vocals — switching between Japanese and English — sent through a vocoder filter until they sound like they’re emanating from the universe itself. Behind her, programmed beats tick and squelch and instruments appear for a moment, then vanish. The featured soloists (trumpeter Adam O’Farrill on “Aratani,” violinist Lauren Cauley on “Saturn Square Venus,” David Leon on “In The Wild”) add a more human element, resisting absorption into the digital illusion Dohi is conjuring around them. “Shahzad + Erika,” a highlight, is a duet with Shahzad Ismaily, his synth drones rising like locusts to drown out her piano, which seems out of tune, or maybe just underwater."
-Phil Freeman, Downbeat