Live at Yoshiwara is the first live album by French musical mischief makers
Ghost Rhythms. This core ten-piece (plus supplemental players) led by composers, drummer
Xavier Gélard and pianist
Camille Petit, have been together since 2005, and have issued three studio full-lengths, all on their Paris independent Laboratoire d'Exploration Musicale (LED). This date, recorded live in their rehearsal studio, is their first to appear stateside. None of the core members of
Ghost Rhythms are full-time professional musicians -- for most, this is their only regular band. Nonetheless, they assemble every Friday night for rehearsals that serve as workshops for trying out new material and arrangements with input from all members. Their band's mischief doesn't exist only inside the music. This set is conceptually fictional: a concert compiled from performances in unlikely and/or non-existent or long-gone locations between 1834 and 2123. Yoshiwara itself is the name of the club in
Fritz Lang's film Metropolis from 1927. Only
Ghost Rhythms knows why.