MESSER

In the organizer's words:

"Where there is a crater, there must have been an incident. Something has hit or erupted where there is now silence. In 2012, Messer spewed a feverish debut into the bubbling enthusiasm for punk from Germany and grew into a formative voice in the post-punk revival of the decade - probably precisely because they are still at odds with the present, keeping an eye on it, touching it, but not being absorbed by it or allowing themselves to be driven by it. Numerous rock bands talk themselves into being stagnant, whereas the group Messer's belief in the band format brings them forward. Four people - Pogo McCartney, Milek, Hendrik Otremba, Philipp Wulf - who come together again and again, from their lives and other creative work, with new acquaintances and impulses, to work out what their shared aesthetic vision can actually look like right now.
You can hear the celebration of this concept on the new album.
[...]
Messer remain ambivalent, questioning and searching, especially when it comes to war and peace or the future of the planet. The movement is already in the title: the "knife-related word" crater, says Otremba, "is ambiguous, a word where it is clear: you have to relate to it. It's a sharp-edged, rugged word." There is always the potential for an explosion in a crater; the next war lurks in peace.
In the primacy of the aesthetic, Kratermusik is a typical Messeralbum, even in its usual transgression of what post-punk can be. This band has never sounded more diverse, their reference system remains inscrutable. At the same time, the pop tides are washing up a (new) Neue Deutsche Welle again, but Messer remain committed to their own cycles and are in a constant state of transition: never completely dissolving metaphors, always illuminating motifs anew, relating sounds to each other in a different way."

B.O./TK/VVK