(2020) K. Leimer - A Figure of Loss


Review:
With releases by Kerry Leimer extending back decades, it would seem difficult if not impossible to pinpoint one as his most deeply affecting. That said, A Figure of Loss might well be it: of all the Leimer releases I’ve heard, none is as moving as this one. Though text accompanying the release acknowledges the recording, created “during two dark years,” takes his music “into highly personal terrain,” no further details are provided as to what that might be (aside, that is, from the perhaps revealing dedication “For Boot” tucked into the album credits); the evidence suggests, however, loss of a profoundly personal kind, the music perhaps the tenderest Leimer’s ever shared. Credited with modeled piano, digital synthesis, sampled sources, telecaster, field recordings, and noise, Leimer advances through eight painterly soundscapes pitched at a generally restrained and placid level. Each piece hovers serenely in place, every detail interlaced carefully with another. Single-note piano patterns are the nucleus around which clusters of other sounds are woven, all of it given a slightly blurry quality to heighten its dream-like quality. Such material encourages reflection and withdrawal from a preoccupation with everyday concerns. Leimer’s gift for shaping musical sounds into entrancing wholes is on full display, specifically in the way these fragile, texturally rich constructions sustain themselves for minutes at a time. With piano a central detail, some hint of a connection could be made to the opening piece on Music For Airports; the pattern Robert Wyatt plays, however, repeats throughout Eno’s setting, whereas piano in Leimer’s productions advances without settling into predictable patterns. Still, to say it’s the core element on A Figure of Loss isn’t inaccurate but perhaps a bit misleading when other sounds figure prominently too. An odd, strangely arresting electronic motif is the material on which much of “Dwell” hangs, for instance, though other sounds emerge as forcefully in its arrangement, electric bass and flickering percussive accents among them. While the album’s tone is largely plaintive and reserved, a moment of comparative levity surfaces in the percolating“Individuation.” But if there’s a coup de grace, it would have to be “This day is the same day,” a lovely, meticulously calibrated meditation sixteen minutes in length; the balance Leimer achieves throughout this softly glimmering exercise in becalmed placidity is masterful. As if the music wasn’t suggestive on its own terms, the B&W photographs by Tyler Boley shown on the fold-out package and the eight-page booklet reinforce the elegiac impression made by the eight settings. Yet while that is the case, two of the booklet’s photos radiate with colour, even if somewhat mutedly, a gesture perhaps meant to convey recovery and hope.





Tracklist:



Media Report:
Genre: ambient, experimental
Source: CD
Format: FLAC
Format/Info: Free Lossless Audio Codec, 16-bit PCM
Bit rate mode: Variable
Channel(s): 2 channels
Sampling rate: 44.1 KHz
Bit depth: 16 bits