Mark Kirschenmann Releases An Experimental And Edgy Set of Pieces
Mark Kirschenmann has recently released a new album that sort of invades your senses by way of creating electronic and experimental atmospheres and sounds that can be edgy, a bit colorful, and certainly outside the box, to say the least.
Return To Sender is a 7-track release consisting of experimentation in feedback and analog sequencing that comes at you in these waves.
The underlying theme of this record, to me, indicates a little bit of rambunctiousness or an unhinged wildness that feels, again, maybe a little invasive.
You either embrace it or run from it. I chose to embrace it, and when I did, I found a whole different atmosphere to latch onto. The aesthetic of this record is sonically thriving from beginning to end, and that almost out-of-control, chaotic feel that the record delivers lingered with me after I was finished.
The whole thing has a tone and texture to it that affects your mood. So, when I say it lingered with me, I mean I kept hearing certain elements of the record long after it was over. I still had this sort of feeling like something under my skin was crawling.
I don't know about you, but I love when records affect me in any way like this. This is mainly because it rarely happens. I barely ever hear a record that I carry with me throughout the day in such a physical sense.
The first entitled track hits us with blips and bleeps, a sort of click-track underbelly, and a bit of fierceness in its tonality.
This sort of noisy approach opens the door for the record well. It sets you up for some of the levels of textural ferociousness that you can expect.
This is followed by "Closed Circuits," which continues on with the same clicking rhythm, and I love this aspect about it. This one gives you shorter sets of those sort of blips and analog feedback chunks that sort of hit you like tiny whips lashing at your ears.
As I mentioned earlier, there is this element of not just invasive but aggressiveness in some of these pieces.
I don't know if it's done on purpose, but it sort of feels a little intense in terms of that edginess or overlaying almost erratic aesthetic.
Then comes "Circuit Breaker," which starts branching out a little bit more, giving different melodic tonalities along with some of the edgy underbellies, and you start to hear different sounds forming.
Along with the analog feedback texture of the record comes different levels of melodic drive. This lets the records start feeling a little bit filmic at times, and delivers some lush melody along with all of the sharp edginess the pieces portray.
"Touch Sensitive" comes in with something that sounds like it's straight out of a horror movie. It's one of those moments where the main character is opening a door to a dark hallway or basement, and you hear that sort of eerie sound coming out.
This Morrison turns into a bit of a synth-driven piece that feels almost like ringtones on an old push-button telephone being controlled by a keyboard.
Again, these elements of melody start coming into play, but they're not the main character. The main character is the aggressive and textural cutting that the sounds produce.
You can tell that the artist had plenty of fun sculpting this.
One of my favorites on the record and probably one of the more outside-the-box or experimental pieces is one called "Round Trip," which has its own vibe. The tonality of this one is a little warmer than a lot of the rest of them. It doesn't come through as cutting or sharp as some of the other songs do, and I dig that because it's a good little breath of fresh air on the record.
There are a lot of different elements of rhythmic patterns that also help drive the record forward. I think the rhythmic patterns, along with the textural and tonal elements of this analog-feedback-riddled set of pieces, are both really key elements to how it all comes through.
There's something deepening about it. There's something that almost calls you out and lets you get transfixed by everything you're hearing.
There are certain parts of the record that feel almost hypnotic.
I dig a record that can affect you this way.
The record closes with "Crosstalk," which is probably because he's tweaking these synth feedback sounds with a knob, and it sounds almost like walkie-talkies trying to communicate with each other.
This is such a cool, almost alien-like record. There's the analog aspect, and if you have a certain age, you will connect with that a lot. But there's also that sort of futuristic alien communication element to it as well.
I found myself sort of swimming through this wild record and really getting engulfed by everything it had to offer.
So, stop reading and start listening. Dig into this one and see what it does for you.
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