WREKMEISTER HARMONIES – Flowers In The Spring – LP – Vinyl [FEB 21]

LP – Black Vinyl.

Wrekmeister Harmonies, the duo of JR Robinson and Esther Shaw, are sonic shape shifters with expansive ideas. From special performances to collaborations the band have worked with David Yow (Jesus Lizard) Ryley Walker, Ken Vandermark, Bruce Lamont, Mark Solotroff, Sanford Parker, Jamie Fennely (Mind Over Mirrors), The Body, Mary Lattimore, Olivia Block, Jamie Stewart (Xiu Xiu), Chris Brokaw, Fred Lonberg-Holm and Thor Harris (Swans). Inspired by artists such as Glenn Branca, Rhys Chatham, and Lou Reed, the duo approach each album as a new sonic adventure.

Flowers in the Spring was born of deep, careful listening as much as composing. It explores music as a meditative practice with a focus on microtonal shifts and intersectional overtones. Robinson explains: Its the subtle movements within and without, the fine threads of sound, loud or quiet, interior or exterior that become valuable.

Limiting himselfto just four mixer channels on each piece; precisely layering guitar and electronics, intently listening and manipulating either the intensity or the duration of each loop to yield unexpected interactions, moments of beauty as well as dissonance.

Flowers in Spring emerges from fizzing distortion, hewing monolithic slabs of drone from the rock face while electronics push through fissures. Fuck the Pigs uses layers of noise as it metaphorically shifts into the depths of winter, arctic winds howling while the guitar scars like frost across a windowpane. In contrast A Shepherd Stares Into the Sun is pure light and heat, overwhelming in its sheer celestial enormity.

Flowers Variation was born of natures microscopic subterranean movements in its primordial gloom and buzzing synth pads. Each track holds multitudes of micro sonic details coming together to form the albums expansive ecosystem.

…an immensely rewarding listen that takes both his bandand the hybrid genre hes helping inventto new heights. – Pitchfork

Robinsons musical vision is as naturally imposing on a recording as you imagine his grey-bearded, urban- shaman-with-knuckle-tattoos-appearance would be in the flesh. – The Quietus

Intense, genre-defying – Brooklyn Vegan

Tracklist:

1. Flowers in the Spring
2. Fuck the Pigs
3. A Shepherd Stares into the Sun
4. Flowers Variation