Nearly a year in the making, and including a cast of 30 musicians, J.R. Robinson delivers his towering third album as Wrekmeister Harmonies entitled Night of Your Ascension. As with previous Wrekmeister albums, the ensemble is made up of an all-star cast of musicians from the metal, new music and rock communities. Musicians include Lee Buford and Chip King from The Body, Alexander Hacke (Einsturzende Neubauten), Cooper Crain (Cave), Marissa Nadler, Mary Lattimore, Olivia Block, Eric Chaleff (Bloodiest), Dylan O’Toole and Ron DeFries of Indian, Bruce Lamont, Sanford Parker (Twilight), Mark Solotroff (Anatomy of Habit), Solomon Lee Walker, Chris Brokow (Come), and Jaime Fennelly (Mind Over Mirrors). Robinson has long been fascinated with those whose habits or actions have set them beyond the reach of redemption. Through his video art and his music, Robinson continues to explore humanity’s darkest impulses and society’s response to them. The death of Father John Goeghan and the life of Don Carlo Gesualdo were starting points for the two compositions on his new album.

Robinson has long been pre-occupied with society’s unwanted, observing the horror of their acts while trying to identify with their conflict. Why do we gawk at those ravaged by violence or mental illness? Why do we turn a blind eye to the unspeakable barbarity committed by “civilized” nations? Night of Your Ascension is a commentary on our own fascination with bloodlust and our seemingly insatiable appetite for lurid depictions of depravity. The music on Night of Your Ascension is as hauntingly beautiful as it is brutal, the questions it provokes are weighty.