“OK Tokyo”: Rodrigo y Gabriela through Halcro, Kharma and MSB

Two guitars, several rhythmic jobs

In “OK Tokyo,” Rodrigo y Gabriela make acoustic guitars carry melody, percussion and pulse at once. Lead and rhythm keep trading places as picked lines, strummed accents and blows to the guitar bodies lock into a shared groove.

Rodrigo y Gabriela wrote and performed the track. HFI played the version from the 2008 ATO Records release Live in Japan.

Live in Japan captures the duo’s Japanese concert debut at Tokyo’s Duo club on 30 March 2008, a show that had sold out weeks earlier. The then-new “OK Tokyo” opens the 14-track set before older material and the two solo features, welcoming the audience into that particular night.¹

A system built in distinct stages

A Laufer Teknik Memory Player MP-32 served as network server and streamer, feeding an MSB Technology Cascade DAC. A Halcro Equinox preamplifier drove Halcro Eclipse monoblocks into Kharma Enigma Veyron 4D loudspeakers.

MSB separates The Cascade into a Digital Director for interfaces and processing, an Analog Converter and a Powerbase, with an optical link between the digital and conversion chassis. Halcro says the Equinox keeps power and control in one enclosure and audio circuitry in another; the Eclipse monoblocks place the power supply, input stage, power stage and output filtering in separate shielded sections.²³⁴

Following attack, body and decay

Start with the leading edge of each picked note, then stay for the guitar body and the short decay that follows. The percussive gestures belong to the music’s pulse. When both parts grow dense, follow each pattern without losing their shared groove.

On a second pass, remember that this piece opened the concert. Hear how the players establish a common pulse before the album moves into older material, then lower the level and notice which rhythmic cues still hold your attention.

How the room was recorded

HFI captured the session at SELekt in Seoul on 25 June 2026 with DPA-4011 microphones and a Zoom F8n Pro at 192 kHz/32-bit float. Sennheiser HD820 headphones were used during production.

For “OK Tokyo,” HFI set the matched DPA-4011 microphones for the sweet spot and used a laser distance meter to check their exact distance from the loudspeakers.