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Reviews

Anchor and Burden — Kosmonautik Pilgrimage
(Moonjune MJ127, 2023, CD / DL)

by Jon Davis, Published 2023-06-26

Kosmonautik Pilgrimage Cover art

Kosmonautik Pilgrimage is either the sixth or seventh Anchor and Burden release, depending on whether you count Markus Reuter’s solo album called Anchor and Burden, which set the stage for the group’s activities. Pilgrimage also marks the first change in personnel for the improvising collective, with Asaf Sirkis taking over the drum seat from Shawn Crowder. There is also a slight change in feeling to the music — whether that’s a direct result of Sirkis or more of a holistic thing I wouldn’t venture to speculate. In any case, there’s an indefinable sense of sounding more composed to the nine tracks on the album. Some of that comes down to Alexander Dowerk, who seems to handle the “bass” parts on his Touch Guitar, while Reuter gravitates toward the “lead” role. Dowerk does a great job of coming up with bass lines that have enough repetition to give each piece a kind of character and cohesion, but vary enough to reveal their spontaneous origin. These qualities are picked up and built upon by Sirkis, who has already proven himself a master of jazz drumming in an experimental rock context. What I mean is that rock drumming is generally built upon a set pattern that serves as a backbeat to the music, whereas jazz drumming involves keeping the tempo somewhere, usually on a cymbal, and using the rest of the kit to improvise accents that work together with the other instruments (there are exceptions, of course, but this is generally the case). Sirkis is very good at bridging these two ways of approaching the drums. As for the rest of the group, Reuter provides soundscapes, washes of sound that provide a background for the proceedings, as well as Fripp-like lead lines. Bernhard Wöstheinrich’s synthesizers work with Reuter’s soundscapes as well as providing all manner of unconventional electronic sounds that fill out the sonic space. All of the Anchor and Burden releases contain fascinating music, but Kosmonautik Pilgrimage is probably the most successful so far in making a coherent musical statement, and is a great place to start if you’ve never heard the band before.

Filed under: New releases, 2023 releases

Related artist(s): Markus Reuter, Asaf Sirkis, Bernhard Wöstheinrich, Anchor and Burden

More info
http://anchorandburden.bandcamp.com/album/kosmonautik-pilgrimage

 

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