Kosmischer Pitch - Jan Jelinek

Kosmischer Pitch (Lost in the Aisles #1)

Jan Jelinek
-Scape Records.

SCQ Rating: 68%

As someone who habitually wanders through electronic bins looking for something new and bizarre, finding Kosmischer Pitch was an exciting discovery (not only because I’d heard his reputation was that of an innovative musician, but also because it was constantly $25 wherever I saw it, and here it was $10). While I haven’t heard any of Jelinek’s previous work, I am familiar with –Scape as a provocative German label that specializes in ambient and electronic records (Pole, among others). Kosmischer Pitch certainly fits into the fold, but displays finesse for psychedelic prog-rock attributes that give this record a multitude of additional dimensions.

The most evident influence of prog-rock is easy to spot, as the use of guitars in ‘Lithiummelodie 1’ aren’t so much treated as buried in beats that consist of layered hisses and looped field-recordings. ‘Planeten in Halbtrauer’ is indicative of the record as a whole, presenting another series of loops that seem immobile but build intensity and shift mood like chameleon skin. In fact, much of the guitar tones might in fact be keyboard, who knows? The organic feel of this record isn’t so because of any guitar or traditional instruments as it is organic in texture, which is a remarkable achievement for any electronic artist.

Not even Jelinek’s great talent can save some of this material from being too unnerving to enjoy on a regular basis. The opposite of comfort music, Kosmischer Pitch will be chosen for only the most severe of space-outs, when leaving the stratosphere of normalcy is the listener’s primary concern. The recognizable jazz shuffle of ‘Western Mimikry’ is one of the few instances where this record manages to be understated, and therefore, cooperative with the objectives of everyday life (playable while working on a paper, talking to friends, concentrating on anything). The rest of these tracks, however, are meant for absolute recreation-time.

The cover art is truly the best possible for this kind of record; its fungi-covered trunk is detailed in almost scientific closeness, while not so close as to confuse what we’re looking at – nature in evolution. Like Jelinek’s compositions, which modify as they grow, the aural samples of night-time creatures (owls, bugs, foliage in the breeze) compliment this mossy cover image. Mingling amidst the heady loops, tracks like the softly pulsing ‘Vibraphonspulen’ or the crawling panic of ‘Lemminge und Lurchen Inc.’ feel under the microscope, as if victims to the cover’s psychotropic mushrooms, we become obsessed with the grain of each sound and attempt to decode its inherent mysteries.