Masaki Batoh, frontman of Japanese pioneers Ghost, is set to release Brain Pulse Music on 28 February on Drag City.
It's a little hard to describe the project, meant to honor the victims of last year's tsunami/earthquake in Japan, so I'm going to repost this little bit of information:
BPM is an acronym for Brain Pulse Music.
The BPM machine created for this project [has] been developed and built by MKC Inc., upon Batoh's request, and consists of headgear and a motherboard. In order to see the immediate effects on the level of brain waves, a special set of goggles that project indicator lamps (synchronized with the motherboard) are worn during the performance of the recording session. The headgear is worn by the performer, which picks up brain waves from the parietal and frontal lobes and sends them, via radio waves, to the motherboard. The motherboard then converts the radio waves via a generator into wave pulses, which are then output as sound. Due to the concurrency of the action, the second-by-second reflection of our mental state renders itself as sound and we hear it instantaneously.
By controlling one’s mental condition, one can manipulate sound without having to hold a musical instrument, though this requires training to a certain extent. Not everyone will be able to control the sound to their satisfaction on their first attempt. Through a state of total relaxation, or by reaching a state of "anatta" (not-self), the machine captures the microscopic fluctuation of brain waves. The "awakening" that emerges from a relaxed mental state becomes an important key to this program.
Watch the video below to get an idea of this new project tom Masaki Batoh.