Messias Maschine

The Heavenly Music Collaboration The German instrumental duo SANKT OTTEN - consisting of Stephan Otten (drums, programming, synthesizers) and Oliver Klemm (guitars, bass, synthesizers) - already teamed up in 1999 and joined DENOVALI RECORDS' roster in 2009. With as much as six full length albums under their belt, their upcoming seventh longplayer MESSIAS MASCHINE (Eng.: 'Messiah machine') is something particularly special as it features collaborations with various pioneers and great exponents of electronic and avantgarde music. Last summer on one of their live shows Sankt Otten met HARALD GROSSKOPF, drummer of ASHRA (as well as appearing on albums of KLAUS SCHULZE). This day wasn't only the starting point for the collaboration with Grosskopf on the track 'Wenn ein Masterplan keiner ist', but furthermore motivated Sankt Otten to invite other musicians to contribute to their 2013 release. All but the eponymous track MESSIAS MASCHINE feature remarkable guest musicians from different generations and musical backgrounds, resulting in an especially varied album. Participating musicians are JAKI LIEBEZEIT (CAN), Ulrich Schnauss, COLEY DUANE DENNIS (Maserati) and CHRISTOPH CLÖSER (BOHREN & DER CLUB OF GORE) among others. For the artwork of MESSIAS MASCHINE Spanish artist SALUSTIANO again borrowed SANKT OTTEN some of his significant paintings. The whole release is a wonderful masterpiece of electronic music. By mixing the unique melancholy of SANKT OTTEN with ingredients of contemporary synth-music and the heritage of German pioneers of progressive electronic music, the band is moving KRAUTROCK into 2013. Sankt Otten are extremely proud having convinced legendary CAN-drummer JAKI LIEBEZEIT to collaborate. Jaki, this 75-year old "Human Drum Machine" joined with his mantric and experimental beats on three tracks. The recording sessions reconfirmed what Jaki's fellow band member HOLGER CZUKAY once said: "Jaki plays like a machine. Just better." Another album highlight is the appearance of ULRICH SCHNAUSS, who added some of his distinctive synth layers and percussion to the title 'Im Himmel angekommen'. Furthermore, theremin maestro MILES BROWN of THE NIGHT TERRORS and HEIRS from Australia joined the cooperation and played a haunting melody on a 7/8 beat of Stephan Otten's unique electronic drumming. COLEY DUANE DENNIS, head of US-postrock legend MASERATI recorded a tremendous echo-guitar for 'Da kann selbst Gott nur staunen' – vesting the track with a sound that easily could have arisen from a session of KRAFTWERK playing with PINK FLOYD. Following the MAJEURE / SANKT OTTEN split album in 2011, ZOMBI / MAJEURE drummer A.E PATERRA now returns with powerful acoustic live drumming on 'Nach Dir die Sinnesflut'. Finally, the album ends with an epic twelve-minute ambient track, which marvelously combines Oliver Klemm’s guitar layers with a sax solo of CHRISTOPH CLÖSER of BOHREN & DER CLUB OF GORE / THE NEST. MESSIAS MASCHINE is indeed a heavenly music collaboration. Mostly covered in white, marvelous colour pencil drawings of Salustiano have been used for the artwork of the record - following up his red and black series paintings for the previous two releases GOTTES SYNTHESIZER and SEQUENCER LIEBE.