Review

Pieter Kock

Bright Bars From The Stars

Meakusma • 2024

With »Bright Bars From The Stars«, Pieter Kock delivers a house and downtempo album that’s delightfully off the beaten track. While brimming with creativity, the album shares a defining characteristic: hardly any track undergoes a truly noticeable, striking development. Instead, the tracks almost always reveal their components and secrets right from the start. This is a mark of quality, as the music doesn’t lose any tension. On the contrary, this openness allows the producer to focus much more on the subtle micro-changes—it’s these that ultimately create the special atmosphere.

»Bright Bars From The Stars« is seven tracks long. The beginning and the end are formed by the slowed down, tribalistic pieces »Ko Blij Nie Sta« and »This Bamboo Is Poisoned«. Alongside the beautifully sad deep-house track »Facial Recognition«, it is above all »Giving In A Box Office« that sets the LP apart from many productions. »Bright Bars From The Stars« is a deep, somewhat confusing album. In its seemingly transparent nature there are a multitude of folds to be discovered. As befits sophisticated minimal music, it takes time. If you give the pieces that time, a power and beauty of its own unfolds.