21st CENTURY SCHIZOID MEN?….Reuter/Motzer/Grohowsii: Bleed, Anchor And Burden: Kosmonautik Pilgrimage, Stephan Thelen: Fractal Guitar 3

In the wake of King Crimson, today’s fusion bands carry a sonic debt to the visionary guitar work of Robert Fripp. These three recent albums from Moonjune Records reveal tributaries from that band’s deep waters.

Markus Reuter, playing Touch Guitars and loops, teams with Tim Motzer on  wide variety of 6 and 12 string axes, along with electronics and drummer/percussionist Keny Grohowski for a collection of thick and palpable musical textures. The strings sear through tar pit thickness on “Bleed” and the gurgling “Oracle Chamber” while the strings ruminate through various tapes, waiting for someone to repeat “Number Nine” on “Free In The Now”. Synth scapes dominate the pretty “Causatum” and Sibylinnie’ with free rock thundered by Grohwski on “Externalities of the Truest Universality”. Metallica going Red?

Markus Reuter is found again on the next album, joined with Touch Guitar man  Alexnder Paul Dowerk, drummer Asaf Sirkis and keyboard/electronics player Bernhard Wostheinrich. This album feels like something Robert Fripp might have come up with, forming     atmospheres of grey on “Crown  Hive” , dark eerie skies on “Cerebral Transfixations”  or jagged edges around a bass line gone wild on “Corridors of Silent Screams”. A mix of ambience and the ominous are formed on “Shivering Walls”  with Sirkis riding the cymbal  like a whip on “Self Assembly”. Black and Starless, without the Bible

Stephan Thelan continues his catalogue building of guitar fests. This one brings in (once again) Markus Reuter along with Jon Durant, Bill Walker, StefanHuth, Barry Cleveland and Eivind Aarset on various gutars, as well as Manuel Pasquinelli-Yogev Gabay/dr, Andi Pupato/pec and  Fabio Anile/keys. This alluring and multi-dimensioned album includes pretty pulses on “Morning Star’ and a mix of funk and effects on “Glitch” . The guitars chime on the rich journey of “Ascension” with heavy hitting changing directions and highways on “Through The Stargate” and Metallica meeting up with THRAK on “Black On Electric Blue”. This is a unit that needs to be seen to be believed. Any tours coming up?