Marching With Feathers

Composer and Tin Hat Trio founder Rob Burgers 2019 solo album The Grid was a highly imaginative effort that blended the feel of his soundtrack work with kosmische influences, incorporating lo-fi electronics along with strings, mallet percussion, and other acoustic instruments. Marching with Feathers works along similar lines, but feels a bit less playful and perhaps more ruminative. Like his previous release, this album doesnt focus on pieces for one specific instrument, giving room to intimate, patiently paced piano compositions as well as beat-driven electronic tracks. "Library Science" is a wayward caravan of patting drum machines, fluttering accordion, and desert drone. "Hotel for Saints" sets a resonating piano melody atop a slowly thumping distorted beat, leavened with ethereal slide guitar and slightly dubby effects. A haunting cello winds its way through the tiptoeing chords of "Ground Cover," which soon become accompanied by dazzling synths that rise into the air like steam. On the albums title track, a drum machine putters its way through thick layers of strings, lapsing into a shouted rally scene for a brief moment in acknowledgment of the wave of protests against racial injustice during the middle of 2020, when the album was being written. While Burger acknowledges the necessity of resistance and revolution, the title Marching with Feathers clearly implies that he believes in peaceful, compassionate protest rather than violence. His music doesnt feel like a call to action, but it does provide space for the listener to reflect and have hope for the future. ~ Paul Simpson