Kashaiof (ַּכָשיֹוף) is the duo project of Eyal Lally Bitton and Itzik Gil Avizohar, both are interdisciplinary artists and central mainstays in Jerusalem's experimental music scene as being core members of the extreme art collective, studio and underground venue Studio Straus.
Named after an archaic local electronic components store, the project’s title is also a phonetic echo of the Hebrew word ‘Kishoof’ (כישוף) meaning sorcery. The enigmatic duo take the practice to heart as they conjure up technology, magick, nostalgia and primordial/ futuristic elements into their sonic artillery; with bone-piercing vocals, lucid melodies and compositional approaches derived from early electronic music and musique concrète, they introduce the aesthetics of Power Romantics: a dichotomy between captivating sublime harmonies and uncontained chaotic elements. This extreme dynamic range reflects the complexity of the environment which brought it to life, particularly the volatile nexus of spirituality and violence which is the holy city, Jerusalem.
Kashaiof's debut album Home (released in 2020 via Chondritic Sound, LA), described as a true isolationist; an audible daymare, questions the perception of mundane, everyday objects and their ability to evoke the uncanny.
In their upcoming album MA out on Under My Feet. on February 18th Kashaiof shifted their focus from the objects themselves to the in-betweenness. For the two, the term 'MA' lies in ambiguity - in Hebrew (ָמה) means - “what״, while in Japanese (間) means - negative space, gap, pause. On this seam, Kashaiof are exploring the potentiality in those gaps, an invitation to the unknown in order to look after the poetic connections that emerge and construct the world of MA - resulting in their most unique aesthetics yet, morphing between genres, structures and compositional approaches. This album offers the view of a multi-layered horizon under which Bitton and Avizohar sculpt a dreamlike sonic emotional world, built on unanswered questions.