Monika Roscher Bigband (MRB) is comprised of 18 musicians and exists somewhere between math-rock, prog-jazz, avant-pop and experimental electronics.
Having issued the epic and uptempo ‘8 Prinzessinnen’ (8 Princesses) VIDEO as an opening salvo from their upcoming third album at the beginning of February, they end the month with a rather more glacial follow-up.
‘Starlight Nightcrash’ unfurls gradually in darkly haunting fashion and is about the beauty of the natural world as well as its frighteningly destructive power. Roscher explains that it “was written like a constant breaking of waves with an ebb and flow capable of crushing everything in the blink of an eye. Its moments of tranquility allude to the peace of mind that opens up once you face this elementary force with calm and acceptance.”
The mangled sounds of a circuit-hacked Casio keyboard flicker through the song even as her band sparkle in lush symphonic colours. “The brutal, the tender, the loving, the destructive, everything is inextricably connected. ‘Starlight Nightcrash’ is like the cosmos having a dialogue with the brittleness of life,” she continues. “At its emotional core is the feeling of having escaped certain death by sheer unfathomable luck and our inability to process the fact that the natural world just moves on as before, serene and indifferent.”
One of Roscher’s band members built an LED instrument suit for her to wear and play during live performances of this song. A photo of it can be seen below, with further info available in a video HERE.
