Hirono Nishiyama is often mentioned in the same breath as the prodigious glitch electronica artist Nobukazu Takemurra - and why not, Nishiyama's delicate voice not only glides like a kite through Takemura's coquettish compositions, but she herself dabbles in plangent and gently bewitching electronic atmospheres constellated by dripping water color textures and sweet, daydreamy melodies. Nishiyama's first full-length release drew support and fit amiably alongside other releases from Taylor Deupree's quirky pop label, Happy, but now some three years later, Nishiyama's interests ebb out into other lands, most notably those of soft jazz, dream pop, and even bossa nova.

A piece such as "This Moon Following Me" sees lazy acoustic chords and giddily wayward tempos evoking a rural sense of place, while "Seed Of Sky" sprays its canvas with bursts of sugary lo-fi noise, ramshackle, scrapyard beats and bittersweet piano chords to give the work a delightfully astral aura.

The album on a whole moves lithely between muted melodrama and colorful, expansive drifts of sound. Little ever moves beyond this hallucinatory equilibrium. Much as other artists such as Takagi Masakatsu, Nishiyama seems to play in an area quite removed from any inkling of pretense or enervation. With spangling skeins of twitching percussion, looped keyboards and sunburst harmonies, Tiny People Singing Over The Rainbow glows during those rare moments of unfettered elation. 7/10 -- Max Schaefer (15 May, 2007)