Best known as the rhythmic engine behind Polish progressive outfit Blindead, Konrad Ciesielski re-emerges on Koniec as a composer of striking scope and sensitivity. This is a record less concerned with volume than with atmosphere — a meticulously crafted blend of jazz, electronica and filmic sound design that unfolds like a journey through half-lit emotional landscapes.
From the opening Out of Gravity and into Miscommunication Land, Ciesielski conjures the kind of brooding pulse that recalls Massive Attack’s Mezzanine — that same fusion of sensual rhythm and uneasy calm heard on Teardrop and Inertia Creeps. Yet where Mezzanine smouldered in shadow, Koniec reaches for light: the drums breathe, the synths shimmer, and space itself becomes part of the composition.
There’s also a kinship here with Craig
Armstrong’s Weather Storm — that same slow-burning elegance where ambient
electronics and orchestral colours intertwine, the emotional power coming not
from volume but from poise and restraint. Like Armstrong, Ciesielski writes in
widescreen: every sound is placed with a composer’s precision, every silence
charged with meaning.
Tracks such as Kamdra reveal his mastery of
tension and release, the groove suspended between movement and meditation with
the haunting saxophone of Patrycia
Temposka. Guest turns — Gabriela
Wasilewska’s spectral vocals, Dawid
Lipka’s elegiac trumpet, Jan Galbas’
minimalist piano — serve the vision rather than divert from it, adding layers
of tone and texture to an already rich palette.
There are echoes of Portishead, too, though Koniec
operates on a grander, more panoramic plane. Where Portishead’s world was noir
and interior, Ciesielski’s is cinematic and elemental — music that suggests
mountains, weather and distance.
Koniec may mean
“The End”, but it feels more like a beginning: the emergence of a distinctive
composer who understands that rhythm can be both heartbeat and horizon. Glenn Wright
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