By Will Kirsch
As a member of the Baltimore band Horse Lords, saxophonist and composer Andrew Bernstein hopes to bridge the gap between the experimental and approachable.
The group, which also features guitarist Owen Gardner, bassist Max Eilbacher and drummer Sam Haberman, has been lauded for drawing from worldly influences to create complex and adventurous rock music couched in a comforting familiarity.
“I consider us an experimental band, but because we’re a rock band it’s more approachable to people,” Bernstein said during a recent interview at Zeke’s Coffee. He joked, “We trick people into dancing to 7/5 polyrhythms.”
Bernstein hopes his first solo album, “An Exploded View of Time,” released last month through Chicago-based label Hausu Mountain, is similarly accessible. For Bernstein, what people consider to be avant-garde draws from anti-elitism of punk, defying expectations and traditions.
“I definitely draw a lot on the energy of punk and that ethos in some ways, and I think avant-garde music does too,” Bernstein says.
As far as albums go, this is a short one; only seven tracks, clocking in at around 35 minutes. Bernstein’s saxophone is entirely alone, without any electronic aids—save for one resonance program that Bernstein himself created—and with limited post-production.
One can hear not only the composition—guided by large droning sax, supported by smaller notes and subtle shifts—but also Bernstein’s breath (“Pressure Wave Meditations I–XXIII”) and the key clicks on his instrument (“Deus Ex Machina” and “Round Up”).
True to its title, the album somehow turns brevity into infinity, a distortion achieved through Bernstein’s talented instrumentation, as well as arrangements that offer the illusion of simplicity while slowly revealing a song’s complicated workings.
Bernstein says he’s drawn to that minimalist style through drone and other unadorned styles of music.
“Music can shift your perception of time, which has always been really compelling for me, and I feel like that music does it well,” Bernstein explains.
Horse Lords play The Crown on Oct. 26 at 9 p.m.
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