Cibo Matto’s second act is deja vu

Yuka Honda describes the re-formation of her band Cibo Matto with a guilelessness that can be refreshing to anyone grown weary of windy pop-star rationales.

“It wasn’t like lightning struck and all of a sudden we decided we had to do it,” said the New York-based multi-instrumentalist of her reunion last year with vocalist (and fellow Japanese expat) Miho Hatori. “I think maybe we just had a feeling that we missed what we had. It always stayed nicely in our memory.”

Fans from Cibo Matto’s first go-round know that refreshment has long been this East Village duo’s specialty. On its delightful 1996 debut, “Viva! La Woman,” Hatori sang largely about the pleasures (and the cultural implications) of food and drink atop Honda’s sample-heavy cut-and-paste productions. “Stereo Type A,” a 1999 follow-up, featured fizzier rhythms and creamier melodies, along with several new group members, including Sean Lennon, the son of John Lennon and Yoko Ono.

“Yuka and Miho were so ahead of their time,” said drummer Billy Martin of the celebrated jazz-funk trio Medeski Martin & Wood. Martin appeared on “Stereo Type A” and later invited Hatori to contribute to a solo record of his. “They were like the perfect blend of fashion and music and commentary, and they had so much fun with it. I see all these young hipsters in Brooklyn now experimenting with forms in this very pop way, and I always think, well, that’s what they were doing.”

Cibo Matto broke up in 2001, though both women stayed active in alternative-music circles: Hatori sang on the first Gorillaz album and formed a Brazilian-inspired duo with guitarist Smokey Hormel, best known for his work with Beck; Honda toured in Lennon’s band and earlier this year released an album she made with L.A.-based singer-violinist Petra Haden under the name If By Yes.

True to Honda’s low-key account, Cibo Matto 2.0 revved to life slowly. Last December, Honda invited Hatori to take part in a concert where she was playing at New York’s Le Poisson Rouge with yet another of her projects, Floored by Four.

“We only did three or four songs together, but as soon as we were onstage I remembered all the great things about playing with her,” Honda said. “There’s definitely a magical chemistry between us that’s very difficult to describe. Ideas that everyone else thinks are crazy seem normal to her and vice versa.”

“When I play with Yuka I feel there’s a Yuka-ness in myself,” said Hatori. “Some parents have kids and the kid becomes the chemistry of those two people. That’s the kind of feeling I have about this band.”

“Yes,” Honda agreed with a laugh. “Cibo Matto is our baby.”

Encouraged by that first gig, the women began meeting regularly to try writing music again. They had no clear-cut timeline to present the fresh material, but after the Japanese tsunami in March, Cibo Matto played a pair of benefit concerts in New York organized by the avant-garde jazz giant John Zorn.

Now the group — a four-piece with Jesse Murphy on bass and Yuko Araki on drums — is amid a brief West Coast tour scheduled to stop Sunday night at the Hollywood Bowl, where Cibo Matto will perform as part of the Big in Japan concert alongside Ono, Yellow Magic Orchestra and Buffalo Daughter. A new album is expected early next year.

Hormel said that although Cibo Matto’s early records were indelibly linked with a specific time and place, “that’s just a transparent thing. Their records always sound like them no matter what the production style is or how they’re working.” The guitarist laughed. “You never know you’re in a scene till afterwards anyway,” he added. “I think whatever they’re up to will be totally current with today’s scene.”

Trendsetters with the understated bearing of tinkerers, Hatori and Honda have been equally surprised and gratified by that interest. “Every now and then somebody comes up to me and says, ‘I know I’m really late, but I just discovered you,’” said Honda. “That makes me really happy.”

“I can’t believe some of the things I’ve heard,” Hatori added. “‘I used to listen to you girls in business school.’ Oh, seriously? You’re crazy!”

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