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Guitar rock will never die. There are just too many cool pedals, effects and guitar-related gadgets in the world to entice eager seekers of way-out sound. Yume Bitsu know all about guitar effects. Over the course of three records, the group have wrangled the low signal of these solitary instruments into shapes and colors of limitless constitutions and consistencies. A roll of the dice in the land of Dryystyn (the fabricated realm which reigns thematically throughout Yume Bitsu) means selecting whichever chance combination of effects pedals elicits the right feel for the leit-motif of the moment. Auspicious Winds takes a collectivist approach to the Yume sound, forging five tracks with nearly as many distinct styles onto one near 50-minute disc. 'Winds' opens with two tracks of ambient wash lightly peppered with vocals. Like much of the record's material, these cuts reach for grandeur, and largely succeed. Next up is Sharp, Twisted, the album's lone stab at a traditional song structure. It's quite a catchy little tune, submerged as it is in power-chord drift, and could very well be the bane of singer/guitarist Adam Forkner's existence. One imagines his friends and fans, upon seeing him, launching into the title verse, gently mocking Yume's successful foray into the land of radio hits. Mothmen Meet The Council Of Frogs is exactly what you'd expect it to be; a strange, supernatural confection of electronics and fantasy soundscape. It leads beautifully into the album's closer, a track which builds into a powerhouse of blissed-out sonic. With its members now scattered across the globe, Yume is on indefinite hiatus, so the time to indulge, dear reader, is now.

G.C. Weeks
CWAS #7 - Spring 2001

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