The last time Matthew Herbert performed in Tokyo, among his instruments were a bag of Big Macs, a pair of Gap jeans and a television set.
For each piece, Herbert took one of these symbols of consumer capitalism and demolished it. The sounds of their demise -- the crinkle of the McDonald's bag, the rip of the jeans' seams, the tinkle of the TV screen as it shattered -- were recorded on a bank of microphones then mixed on the spot into Herbert's trademark quirky, sunny dance music.
"The Mechanics of Destruction," as the performance was called, was that rare thing, a piece of political theater as entertaining as it was educational.
The instruments for Herbert's Big Band project are a tad more traditional. It is, as the name implies, a 20-piece orchestra in the style of Duke Ellington. It might seem like a surprising twist, but in making music Herbert has continually used the most eccentric of means toward creating surprisingly accessible end results.
On last year's album, "Bodily Functions," he sculpted samples of sneezes, farts and other corporeal noises into jazzy house pieces inspired as much by Cole Porter as the latest dance innovations.
Expect his big band to swing, but who knows in which direction.