"Despite its title, the Andrew Endres Collective's first studio release doesn't sound all that desolate—until you listen a little closer. With liner notes stained with terms like "bleakness," "despair" and "hopelessness," and track names like "Threnody" (a lament for the dead), "Zugzwang" (a position in chess in which any move makes things worse for you), "Destitute" and "Hatred of a Thousand," you'd expect an exercise in bummerdom, especially given the titular bandleader-composer's acknowledged lifelong struggle with depression, including a childhood suicide attempt. Yet as each cloud passes, moments of brightness shine through: in Endres' fluid guitar solos and hooky melodies; in Stephanie Cook's sparkling piano solos and foundational riffs; in the warm, concise contributions of saxophonists David Valdez and Lindsey Quint and supple rhythms propelled by the bass and drums of Sam Hallam and James Ford, especially on upbeat tunes like "Loss of Phobia" and "Forgetting Myself." "Misoneism" refers to a Luddite fear of change, but floats dreamily above it. The rock backbeat of "Consciousness" seems to dispel rather than, as the liner notes claim, "embody this feeling of dysphoria." Instead of flinching from or wallowing in the pain of its dark inspirations, Desolation never devolves into mere dreariness, but—to borrow Ray Bradbury's term—confronts it with a tart musical medicine for melancholy." - Brett Campbell (Willamette Week) "Though guitarist Andrew Endres' name toplines this new jazz ensemble, the project really embraces the "collective" part of their moniker. On Desolation, the group's debut album of meditative, European-inspired instrumentals, no single player strives to outshine the rest. That manages to be the case even when the musicians peel off on their own, as the album boasts some of the most understated solos on record. Even a blowsy instrument like a baritone sax (wielded with authority by Lindsey Quint) somehow knows its place. Everyone is working toward the good of the unit, synthesizing into something cooling and exalting." - Robert Ham (Portland Mercury) "Exciting, beautiful, and often haunting melodies, textures, and rhythms catch the ear right from the start if the first track "Forgetting Myself". From there it maintains a consistent high quality throughout and features an excellent variety from track to track, while always retaining a signature, dark, sometimes hypnotic mood. A particularly unique and intriguing aspect of this album is the combined experience of the music and the liner notes. Each track has a thorough description of its inspiration, often with highly intimate and candid sharing from the author/composer. Such a vulnerable and straight forward written expression offers a fantastically refreshing sense of sharing something very closely with Andrew, who might, from the recording alone, seem like a distant and unreachable musical genius to the average listener. This chasm, that can so easily be left uncrossed, is no fault of the actual composition or performances here recorded, but rather simply a result of the common conventions that have developed between performer and listener, particularly in jazz. Andrew has found a beautiful, brilliant, and yet, in retrospect, very obvious way to bridge this gap. He does it with the simple, humble, and intensely honest writings of the liner notes. They make the listener feel closer to him, and therefore listen closer. And there is plenty on this record to listen for." - Damen Easton