Long gone are the days when studying jazz alone could predicate a successful career as an artist (a musician in a monkey suit is another story). Such is the lesson learned by pianist Adrian Klumpes when he left his musical conservatory to pursue a broader spectrum. However, wanderlust can become lost without the structure of institution. Such was the case with Klumpes before discovering the abstract minimal looping of jazz by German producer
Jan Jelinek. Although a dozen time-zones away, Klumpes began fussing with
Jelinek's loops with his trio, Laurence Pike (keyboards) and Ben "Donny" Waples. The resulting 1+3+1 found the three working with
Jelinek, giving them their first exposure outside of Australia. But this release, recorded at roughly the same time, offers
Triosk alone for the first time. On the question of mood, Moment Returns offers only wrappings with the highest thread count, assuring exquisite softness and warmth. "The Streets Are Empty" threatens discomfort with a tingling bell and distant feedback, but instead breaks into stewy piano/drum/bass vamps on "Chrono" which, while going nowhere in particular, lay you back and stretch your feet out. "Love Chariot" broods around metronomic cymbal and bass pulses well akin to
Tortoise while organ-like samples dance gingerly just out of reach. The whole thing builds in the tiniest of increments for the song's five minutes, which leads to the question of technique. In crossing jazz knowledge with electronic proficiency, it is often impossible to tell where one ends and the next begins. Is the splendid build a work of musical proficiency, or a mere trick of the computer clock? Not that it should really matter. Each song takes you to the spectral places that exist in the best moments of classic jazz, when the players have all but stopped playing, the listeners have all but stopped listening, and only the air thick with mood remains. But without the once requisite chords, melodies, improvisations, or what-have-you needed to get to that place; it can feel a bit too easy. ~ Joshua Glazer