stef.in: Icterus II
Rock-funky band led by drummer Stefan Hegerat with guitarists Robyn Gray and Patrick O'Reilly, plus bassist Mark Godfrey
The band stef.in, led by drummer Stefan Hegerat, features the two guitarists Robyn Gray and Patrick O'Reilly plus bassist Mark Godfrey. Icterus II is their second album, coming six or seven years after the first.
Icterus icterus is the bird called the Venezuelan troupial, seen on both the band's album covers. The Calgary-raised, Toronto-trained Hegerat only uses the word jazz in his artist bio about his schooling, and his band is primarily instrumental rock. Its brew contains classic funk, contemporary experimental distorted action, and a bit of ambient texture. Off the first two tracks, "Three Wars" rocks while "Here's to Circle" stays ambient, covering most of the range.
I don't even know which guitarist is which on the record. They interact together like the two leads of a guitar band, not two jazz soloists. The tracks with the most funk are "Dosage", which also has glitches and spaced-out sections; and the short closer "Leave Unattended and Suffer the Consequences", where it's more straight-up with a wah pedal and that old-school bass.
"Aku San Zan" feels like the opus. It has a bass feature and the most soaring riffs, before it cools down. I notice how every track turns on a dime. The tracks aren't even long, so this relatively short project covers a lot of ground.
"Old Guard" and "Our Circle" might be a juxtaposition: Boomers versus Millennials? The former has wonky tuning and fuzzy bass, the latter keeps comfortably whirling. Hegerat wrote all these tunes, and his thoughtful drumming is like a big friendly embrace of his bandmates, whom he's now been with for quite some time.
Then there's "Juan Soto". When the band cut Icterus II in February 2023, Soto was about to start his one full season with the Padres. Hegerat, a confirmed baseball nut, tells me that the title references Soto's big trade to that team in 2022. I wonder what coordinated chord-sprays and garbles they would have weaved together in response to the rumoured Shohei Ohtani flight into their city.
Though the Icterus II album release tour is staying out east, Hegerat plays in an experimental synth-rock band called Parade, who came to play Tyrant Studios and What Lab in August 2023. He's also in a pop-punk band called Chinese Medicine, which will head out west in June and potentially make one or more stops in BC.
released April 4, 2025 | Buy CD (Bandcamp)
