Short Reviews [Markus Reuter & Stefano Castagna - 2023 - "Sea of Hopeless Angels"]

I have been a fan of Markus Reuter’s experimental guitarwork for some years now, and while his releases with Stick Men will always be my favourite (please can you come to New Zealand?), I am also a huge fan of Anchor & Burden so when I realised this started life during the sessions for ‘Kosmonautik Pilgrimage’ I was quite intrigued. Apparently, that was a three-day session, and on the second day Markus was in the studio and decided to create a series of solos in a cleaner fashion than normal. Stefano Castagna was mixing that album, so of course had access to this raw material and felt he could so something with them in a different manner. He has been working with Markus since 2021’s ‘TRUCE 2’ album, both as a mixer and a collaborator, but is also known for a musician in his own right with his love being for where 1980’s art rock intertwines with jazz, Mediterranean music and experimental sound. He has taken the solos and then built layers of keyboards against them to create something which is quite unlike what I would normally expect from Reuter but is an absolute delight. Play this album to anyone, and I can pretty much guarantee they will believe the keyboards were in place and then Markus was asked to play over the top to create a magical blending of the two, and never for once think it was the other way around. I am sure Stefano must have worked through many hours of raw guitar looking for inspiration on what to put against those melodies and experimentation to turn them into pieces which are seamless. It really does sound as if for the most part this was scored and directed with some improvisation over the top, never that Markus was in the studio in his own world creating music with little comprehension of what would happen to it in the end. Much of Reuter’s music is difficult to listen to, as he creates styles which are deliberately challenging, but here he is far more mainstream, and the keyboards have been utilised to push that feeling even further. The result is an album which will be intriguing and interesting to already existing fans while it is a good introduction for those who have yet to investigate his somewhat unusual and often challenging musical world. I do hope there is enough interest for the guys to repeat this experiment as this is a delight.