Japanese music aficionados have a knack of tuning into the musical zeitgeist. Post-rock, Brit-pop and grunge all had substantial audiences in Japan before the rest of the world caught up.

Thomas Belhom (left) and Naim Amor

If this trend holds true, then expect Tucson, Az., to be added to the map of American musical meccas that covers Seattle, Wash., Athens, Ga. and Chicago, Ill.

Tokyo's Saidera Records, a side project of Seigen Ono, best known for his experimental bossa nova recordings and work with fashion label Comme Des Garcons, has become Tokyo's main conduit to Tuscon's musical melange.

Calexico's melancholy tales of riven landscapes and wearied souls had already leached into Tokyo's musical subconscious with their second album, "The Black Light," easily one of the best of 1999. Now, courtesy of Saidera, another group has come out of the Arizona desert: the Amor Belhom Duo.

In Tucson, Naim Amor and Thomas Belhom are known as "those Parisian guys," part of a small international contingent attracted to the city primarily because of the music of indie rock legends Giant Sand. (Long before Americana -- a term used to encompass blues, bluegrass, folk, country and a myriad of genres considered to be distinctly American -- became a byword for musical hipness, Giant Sand looked to America's musical underbelly for inspiration.)

"It's huge and small, gorgeous and ugly at the same time," says Naim Amor, the group's guitarist and vocalist, of his adopted city. "There are 900,000 [people], but the downtown is no bigger than that of a French village in Normandy. There are huge golf courses sucking down water, but the river is completely dry."

Like Calexico (a project of Giant Sand's rhythm section drummer John Covertino and bassist Joey Burns), Amor Belhom Duo's music is infused with the desert's spaciousness.

The cuts on their first Japan release, "The Amor Belhom Duo" (their second full-length album), have the feel of soundscapes, equal parts lounge or dreamy pop and fashioned only tenuously around the structures of songs. Imagine Francis Lai's soundtrack to "Un Homme et Une Femme," threaded through post-punk and Steely Dan.

"We listen to all kinds of music, everything that changed the world a little bit," says Amor. "Mozart did it, but so did the Sex Pistols."

Atmospherics are what link the disparate styles that intermingle on the album. The rowdy Middle Eastern frisson of "Motel Kerkennah," a nod to Amor's Tunisian ancestry, easily segues into the circuitous lounge of "I Lost a Friend" or the almost stereotypically Parisian "Les Valse des 24th," with its whimsical accordion.

"Instead of ambience, we create a universe fed by tradition -- songs, pop, basic instruments -- and improvisation and experimentation," says Amor. "Certainly we want to express many of our traditions such as French pop, Arabic music, movie soundtracks, waltz or jazz. It is chaotic, being everywhere while creating an original universe."

Though Amor and percussionist Thom Belhom first played together in a Parisian hardcore group, they developed their musical chops in the Situationist-inspired performance collective Generation Chaos.

Their experimentalism is subtle, however. Amor Belhom Duo is a sort of rhythmic and guitar-driven pointillism with each innovation adding up to the perfect whole and with no one element outstanding.

Amor is a gifted guitarist capable of coaxing an array of sounds from his instrument from jazzy, almost Django Reinhardt-like riffing to a throaty feedback that recalls My Bloody Valentine. And not since Einsturzende Neubaten rummaged through junkyards has so much stuff been brought to bear on the percussive element of music.

The bells that open "Swamp Coolers" could be Tibetan gongs or something picked up at a flea market. The group's concerts are famous for the pieces of metal, pots and pans that make their way into Belhom's eclectic drum kit. The effect is one of texture rather than tribalism. All sorts of strange things shake or rattle in the background, adding to the layers of sound.

With many of bits of Belhom's rhythmic armory playing particular notes (there are stories of the duo wandering through scrap yards with a tuner), the percussion sometimes seems to push the melodic elements of their songs forward more than the guitar.

It is tempting to label the Amor Belhom Duo as stylists, as it is style that allows the various influences they mix and match to hang together so gracefully. But that would do them an injustice; the term smacks too much of a lack of passion and this album has that in spades. Like a desert mirage, the Amor Belhom Duo crafts music that summons up a sweet sustenance that is just out of reach.

Harlem, the Shibuya club sandwiched between Club Asia and On Air East, has become ground zero for Tokyo's continually exuberant and evolving hip-hop scene.

The slate of performers at this Saturday's jam at Akasaka Blitz, organized by the club, reads like a who's who of the genre with everything from the in-your-face sassiness of MC You the Rock to the wacked out spinning of DJ Hasebe. (His latest video, on high rotation on Viewsic and other music video channels, is a hoot.)

Cutting Edge Records' new compilation "Creation Rebel: Cutting Edge Hip Hop from 1995-2000" is a good primer for the show with cuts from heavy hitters Buddha Brand and Shakkazombie as well as a few gems from those not performing, including K Dub Shine's studied, jazzy cool on "Shining."