Eu m-am plimbat printr-o cada cu bule in straie de print si cersetor, am ajuns la dentist cu o sticla de rom, apoi in mintea unui orb, am scos rime si am incercat sa inteleg umorul matematicienilor. Sunt multe layere, iar la fiecare ascultare descopar inca un sound, mai fac o legatura, imi mai pica o nuca si tot asa. Read more...

Waka X and Qewza are simply great when it comes to playing! The 47 minutes album is an invitation to imagine worlds and adventures and it runs freely on the web. Read more...

Swimé is another quiet but intriguing work from this duo who, like others of their generation (e.g. Gultskra Artikler), have gotten so free that they’ve just left any easy pigeon-holing (“IDM”, “neo-classical”, or elsesuch) far behind. Read more...

Swimé is an ambitious avant garde work containing an exotic blend of organic instrumentation, electronic effects, and a jungle of clicks, buzzes, chirps, screeches, and roars. [...] an album full of surprises and aural curiosities for fans of the cutting edge of sound design and classical composition. Read more...

Makunouchi Bento’s Swimé is a delightful, fanciful soundscape that rattles its way through musical fragments, noises, and cinematic landscapes, sometimes recalling John Cage (particularly when the piano dances over a repeated, asymmetrical motive of some sort). Read more...

Only one word: SPLENDID! Musique experimentale de haute qualité. Musique libre et propice à l'imagination. Public cible: renégats, qui n'aiment ni les bergers ni les troupeaux... Read more...

Their Swimé album has been today's soundtrack. Eerie, atmospheric, intriguing. A very good background for thinking. Read more...

Ca sunet se duce mult către cinematic, uneori având impresia că cineva a luat sunetele dintr-o peliculă şi mi le-a rearanjat aici. Multitudinea de sunete şi de efecte îi dau un aer experimental, iar profunzimea lor (dată de un master foarte curat – înalte, medii şi joase fiind foarte clar delimitate încă din mix) conferă fiecărei piese un iz de calm. Read more...

Cele opt piese incluse pe Swime constituie tot atatea excursii sonore in cotloane nebanuite ale muzicii. [...] E pur si simplu „ceva” care te face sa visezi, care te deconecteaza de mizeriile intalnite la tot pasul, care te poate teleporta intr-o alta lume, nu neaparat mai buna dar cu siguranta „altfel”. Read more...

Swimé is nothing short of exceptional, but if you are familiar with this blog and equally familiar with the album, you’d understand. Swimé, first and foremost, is an experimental album, a collage of disparate sounds, field recordings, odd musical instruments and electronic manipulations. When 2010 winds on down, Makunouchi Bento’s Swimé will be one of the albums I will remember. Read more...

At first, Swimé drowns you in sounds, but as you incorporate it all and immerse in the music forming in your head, you begin to float. Read more...

Probably one of the best Renoise related albums from this year. One of the most interesting Ambient albums of all time. Filled with atmospheric textures and strange sounds from very wide spectrum of superb acoustics. Strange melodies mixed with animal voices, sounds of nature and city into psychotic composition with amazingly clear sound image which won’t leave anyone's emotions untouched. Read more...

Ce-mi place la ei, in contextul in care de cativa ani buni incoace i-am tot ascultat, este migrarea asta dinspre electronic spre organic. Damful digital se simte din ce in ce mai putin. Muzica lor tinde spre natural, spre cinematic. De fapt de la un punct incolo, se trece peste muzica si se ajunge la crearea unui intreg spatiu sonor in care toate elementele au, fiecare in parte, propria regula de functionare. Read more...

Evading any attempt to describe the style of their songs, they whimsically offend the limits of your attention span as you travel within the many scenes they create ; Swimé is a travelling circus filled with suspensful moments, drama and humor. The songs fade into each other, removing any sense of remembrance and letting only the present be. Read more...

As listeners journey through a multitude of sounds, many of which are depicted on the cover, they may get the feeling of being transported. With so much going on in the music, it would have been easy for it to descend into an unlistenable mess. But Makunouchi Bento keeps every noise in its place through clever introductions and timely changes. Read more...

This is some way-out shit that owes as much to avant garde composition as it does to anything we’d call “ambient” in the most commonly used sense. It does indeed have an Eastern feel to it. There’s some bamboo-sounding percussion, mysterious bells, some skronky horn sounds, and a piece that sounds like Fred Frith jamming with some some wind chimes. Read more...

Wirklich herausragendes Album des Franzosen Makunouchi Bento, das sich im Bereich Montage, Ambient oder Musique Concrète bewegt. Fantastische Soundscapes, interessante Montagen mit allerlei Kleinkram. Vom Konsum psychoaktiver Substanzen beim Hören würde ich abraten, das Zeug ist wirklich etwas radioaktiv. Read more...

It’s one of the most interesting things I’ve heard over the last couple years. [...] But I can’t let it go at that! The sound is a dense mix of natural and electronic sounds. At various times you hear many things including water, percussion, accordion, piano, and electronics. But there is much more to it than individual instruments and noises. To me it overall feels like what it might be like taking a boat trip through a swampy forest, almost as pictured on the cover art. Read more...

Lock yourself in a room, put the album on, close your eyes and let Makunouchi Bento’s music guide you in the mental creation of an unwritten film about childhood in the heart of the Balkans; a childhood full of exciting camping trips, folk music, 80s synth hits, animals, fears, curiosity, vaguely-understandable adult conversations and their arguments. Read more...

Les deux Roumains de Makunouchi Bento nous offrent gracieusement un album contenant un savoureux mélange d’instrumentations organiques, d’effets sonores sidérants, de petites mélodies fantômes et de sons concrets aux milles humeurs. “Swimé” est un album peu commun, plein de suprises, d’émotions et d’humour, qui évite la posture parfois sérieuse de la musique dite d’avant garde. Fan de Lynch, Tim Burton ou Sergio Leone, cet album vous est destiné. Read more...

For the Romanian music scene, this is one hell of an experiment - highly sophisticated avant-garde electronic music that is really hard to describe. Tightrope walking on the border towards ambient, they never leave us though in peace - it is a dream scenario undercut with much tension. Not geared towards easy listening, but hey, it's a progress that something this uncommercial and uncompromising comes out of Romania. Read more...