Butoh Dancing and Sax Solos — Bay Area Dark Post-Punk Duo Yama Uba Transform in Their Video “Shapes”

Bay Area darkwave duo Yama Uba dropped a self-directed video for Shapes, a standout from their debut album Silhouettes on Psychic Eye and Ratskin Records. The iridescent dark post-punk track layers Winter Zora’s dreamy old-school guitar and sharp sax riffs over Akiko Sampson’s pulsating disco bass lines and plaintive vocals—a haunting mix of the intensity of Siouxsie Sioux with the raw energy of The Breeders’ Kim Deal and the gothic power of The March Violets and Cocteau Twins.

“When I wrote Shapes, it was about shapeshifting, and the pain that often catalyzes personal growth,” says Sampson. “It was about the vulnerability of intimacy, and unlearning feeling scrutinized as loved ones witness our messy processes,” Sampson states. “But when I compared that to the greater pain of no longer being able to change, it gave a different perspective. I remembered to be grateful for life in its full spectrum, which isn’t always beautiful.”

The video, a tribute to Oakland artist Ara Jo, who perished in the 2016 Ghost Ship Fire, combines the unsettling tension of Sampson’s Butoh with Jo’s abstract photography—her images laced with a flicker of whimsy and optimism.

Butoh, born in post-war Japan in the late 1950s, isn’t for the faint of heart. Tatsumi Hijikata and Kazuo Ohno built the theatrical dance form from the ground up, using slow, deliberate movements and twisted body shapes to confront the big taboos—death, desire, and trauma. It was Japan’s gritty answer to traditional dance and Western influence, a response to the wreckage of war and the ghosts left behind. Butoh isn’t about clean steps or graceful leaps. It’s raw, uncomfortable, sometimes grotesque—a mix of mime, madness, and performance art. Dancers, often painted bone-white, push their bodies to the brink, walking a fine line between beauty and brutality, daring you to look away, but knowing you won’t. It is a beautiful, profound homage to their friend’s memory.

Guitarist and saxophonist Winter Zora states, “The process of visualizing Shapes had a huge impact on us as artists,” says Zora. “We’ve seen it born and taken shape in so many ways to get to what it is today. We wanted to honor our friend Ara Jo in the video because she left a legacy of power and transformation in the Bay Area. Her artistic influence changed all of our lives, and the way we feel about the process of creation. We set out to capture what shapeshifting means to us, and realized along the way that the power within it holds its own consciousness.”

In Shapes, Yama Uba vocalist and video director Akiko Sampson performs eerie butoh dancing in black and white that embodies what Sampson describes as “the pain of change, alongside band footage in vivid colour.

Watch the video for “Shapes” below:

Yama Uba was formed in 2017 by Sampson, and joined by Zora in 2020. In 2024, Yama Uba released their debut album, Silhouettes, on Psychic Eye and Ratskin Records, and toured the United States, Japan and Italy. Yama Uba will perform at Substance Fest in Los Angeles on November 2, 2024, followed by tours in the EU and Japan in 2025.

Listen to Shapes below and order the album Silhouettes here.

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