When Dave Callahan seized power in Moonshake, US guitarist Margaret Fiedler, bassist John Frenett, and sound engineer Guy Fixsen left to form Laika (with flautist Louise Elliott and two percussionists, including drummer Lou Ciccotelli). Fiedler began experimenting with electronic keyboards and Fixsen with sampling.

Preceded by the single Antenna (Too Pure, 1994), Silver Apples Of The Moon (Too Pure, 1994) immediately revealed itself as one of the most original albums of the era. The underlying idea is to merge a dub bass, a dense polyrhythmic carpet, synthesizers, loops, and sampling to give rise to circular and impalpable harmonies, with a touch of jazz and funk. Emblematic of their hypnotic bacchanals is Sugar Daddy (an orgy of percussion and "Brazilian" vocalizations, with melodic bass figures in the foreground, over which alien noises glide). Marimba Song is inspired by that model, with an even more frantic rhythm, a feverish jazz flute, and a more pronounced melody. Let Me Sleep pushes the pedal to the floor and arrives at a galactic variant: the hum of noises becomes an instrument in its own right, competing with a crazed flute, while layered percussion spreads out. The dense but not deafening percussion, the undergrowth of electronic noises, and the singer's soft whisper constitute the three dimensions along which the songs evolve. The contrast is enchanting. Coming Down Glass, for example, unleashes the heaviest rhythm—a mechanical and syncopated one—but the singing is the most persuasive and fairytale-like, and the electronics are almost impalpable.
The music of these surreal ethnic-ambient frescoes is simultaneously danceable, dub, ethnic, and ambient. In the frightening tribal dance of If You Miss, it feels as though one is listening to dozens of drums beating a samba-reggae in unison. The vibraphone repeats a simple melody that returns at intervals, and the vocals intone an almost Indian litany; the result is the hypnosis/ecstasy of meditative art.
It only takes the group to accentuate the jazz component, as in Red River, to hear echoes of the Pop Group and Rip Rig & Panic.
The group's deviant intelligence assimilates remnants of rap (44 Robbers), soul (Honey In Heat), and jazz (Spider Happy Hour) and dilutes them into jams lacking a center of gravity, a melody, or a riff. Having eliminated the guitar and reduced the keyboards to pure background, Laika are not afraid to adopt the marimba, flute, and vibraphone as lead instruments. However, none of these instruments ever rises to be the true "protagonist." The identity of these tracks is precisely that of having no identity.

The soft, light, and underground pop of Sounds Of The Satellites (Too Pure, 1997) benefits from greater instrumental skill. Fixsen now also alternates on trumpet, Elliott (who also plays in a jazz sextet) is more daring on the flute, the percussionists lay down increasingly dense rhythmic carpets, and the synthesizers spread far and wide.
Prairie Dog opens on the heavy traffic of bass and percussion, develops amidst the tinkling of the xylophone and the murmurs of electronics, and closes on flute flourishes.
Synthesizer and flute engage in precious aerial duels in Out Of Sight And Snowblind (seven minutes), whose Arabic motif and tribalism recall the world-music of Jon Hassell. The flute often doubles the song's rhythm with trance-like effects. Some tracks instead focus on the percussiveness of the synthesizers, such as Almost Sleeping (seven minutes).
Only Laika could compose a single like Breather, which smoothly blends the rhythmic triumphs of jungle with the raga-minimalist ecstasies of Terry Riley.
In return, Bedbugs even manages to fuse the jazz-rock of Miles Davis, dizzying African polyrhythms, and the musique concrčte of Morton Subotnik. In these tracks, the "fusion" program of Fiedler and Fixsen is sublimated, as are their polyglot arrangements and layered harmonies.
The limit of this program is the light music of Starry Night, where the arrangement masks what is basically just disengaged lounge jazz. But even in this field, Laika transcend labels. The fluid orchestration of the instrumental track Blood + Bones, swinging and compelling, makes use of xylophone, tropical percussion, and a rhythmic impulse reminiscent of Rip Rig & Panic.
A worthy conclusion to the record is Spooky Rhodes, a cosmic crescendo of percussion and electronics in which a galactic flute is embedded.
To crown it all remains the twilight poetry of Fiedler, who transforms every song into a tender metaphysical act.

Ciccotelli and percussionist Richard Olatunde Baker formed Eardrum, that released the dub-tinged and jazz-tinged Last Night (Leaf, 1999) and a more conventional Afro-beat effort, Side Effects (2001).