JENS KUROSS - Crooked Songs

Who believes a song can change you

Or that singing sets you free?

(“Crooked Song”)

What is the sound of a room breathing? The creak of a chair, a floor settling, the release of a sigh. The world outside like a muffled echo. Jens Kuross decided to shut himself away in a room of his house in Boise, Idaho, with only an electric piano for company. And a handful of songs demanding time and space to reveal themselves.

It might sound like a story we've already heard (from Justin Vernon in a Wisconsin shack to Bruce Springsteen in a bedroom in Colts Neck), and yet the solitude of "Crooked Songs" hits as though it were being told for the very first time. Stripping everything back to its core, to the essential: today more than ever, perhaps, that's the only real alternative to things falling apart.

Kuross had tried his luck in Los Angeles, but he realized that finding himself in the middle of a group songwriting session for Rihanna's new single wasn't exactly his calling: dropped by his manager and agent, he went back home to Idaho, convinced his music career had hit a dead end. That is, until, at the end of 2023, Texan guitarist Hayden Pedigo happened to hear him play, alone with his Wurlitzer: "By the second song I was in tears", he recalls. "It was the first time I'd ever cried over a live performance". So Pedigo went looking for Kuross's previous records, but was immediately taken aback: they had nothing to do with the magic of that performance. Too polished, too tamed. "You need to make a record that sounds exactly like how you played that night", he told him. And Kuross took the advice literally.

For Pedigo, Kuross's music is a cross between Arthur Russell and Harry Nilsson. Yet from the opening "What I Miss Most Of All" onward, the minimalism and lo-fi quality of "Crooked Songs" also evoke certain atmospheres from Perfume Genius's debut, "Learning", only in a softer, more meditative vein.

The pressure of fingers on the keys gives the sound a tangible, pulsing body, while Kuross's voice traces the melody of "No One's Hiding From The Sun" (almost a rarefied version of Andrew Combs's singer-songwriter craft). "Inside Joke" reveals itself defenseless, "Beggar's Nation" flows into a mantra with Radiohead-esque ascendancies. The overall monochrome tone of the tracks reflects the fact that all the recordings come from the early hours of the day, before the world wakes up and resumes its rush. "I put ambient mics in place so you could hear the whole room, not just the voice and the piano," Kuross explains. "That's how I work. I take my time. In a way, it's a process that has something sacred about it. Everything reveals itself with time, over long stretches of time."

One must leave behind the illusion of self-image if one wants to rediscover their true self: "There is a kindness in the loss of who I thought I'd be," Kuross murmurs over the delicate introspection of "Hymn Of Defeat". "For all that has defeated me/ Will one day be defeated". When all seems lost, defeat has a radical wisdom to reveal. And the world no longer has power over us: "Because today I feel like singing/ To stop this world from changing me," goes the title track, with the sobriety of an old liturgical hymn. Then the piano's last note slowly fades away, once again giving way to breath, movement, the sounds of things. No, it isn't mere background noise: it's the space inhabited by Jens Kuross's crooked songs.

Ride the wave of great music

Add OndaRock to your favorite sources on Google Discover. Don't miss our reviews, milestones and latest news straight in your feed.

Follow on Google

10/11/2025