Kyle Bruckmann – oboe, English horn
Tim Daisy – percussion
Anton Hatwich – bass
Jen Clare Paulson – viola
Jason Stein – bass clarinet
PRESS
“The unusual front line of Kyle Bruckmann’s Wrack—viola, oboe, and bass clarinet—gives the quintet a narrow timbral range, but it uses wriggling, high-intensity counterpoint to create an exhilaratingly bright, multilayered sound. As Bruckmann says in the liner notes of the group’s forthcoming third album, Cracked Refraction (due from Porter Records on February 21), “I take perverse glee in using the wrong tools for the job.” The onetime Chicagoan started Wrack as a jazz-oriented project, but over time he’s come to focus more and more on jagged themes, unwieldy time signatures, and tricky pinpoint interplay (a la Anthony Braxton), all played with the postpunk energy of his old band Lozenge—on “Exacerbator,” for example, Jen Clare Paulson’s acidic viola slashes against the grain of a charging unison pattern from Bruckmann’s oboe and Jason Stein’s bass clarinet. Drummer Tim Daisy and bassist Anton Hatwich make for a whirlwind rhythm section, and when they buckle down and play hard they sometimes seem to splinter the front line with their momentum as they signal the rapid-fire shifts in Bruckmann’s knotty, episodic compositions. The intensity can be pretty relentless, which makes the occasional quiet passage—like Paulson’s lyrical, almost hushed solo on “Notwithstanding,” accompanied by light percussion and pointillistic bass—hit just as hard emotionally as the wind players’ most furious barrages.”
“As someone who’s been listening to music of oboist Kyle Bruckmann for several decades, through different projects and styles, his mixture of rigor and humility have been constant. Although he’s a marvelous improviser, he’s been spending more and more time working with composed material, both in Dana Jessen’s Splinter Reeds and with solo work. Of rivers falls into this second category, with a variety of composers taking advantage of Bruckmann’s technical range and his willingness to aim for the impossible.”