Rosa Anschütz

The title of Rosa Anschütz’s current, fourth album initially sends listeners in the wrong direction. »Sabbatical«, released via the Los Angeles-based label Heartworm Press, does not, as one might assume, refer to the artist taking time out. Rather, it marks a phase of deliberate reflection, in which Anschütz turns back to her own beginnings. The underlying idea is to identify the themes weighing on her and process them in new songs, so that she can then move forward freely.

Rosa Anschütz’s music exists within a sonic Bermuda triangle of darkwave, post-punk, and synth-pop, while her work as a whole oscillates between installation, performance, and the album as a Gesamtkunstwerk. With »Votive«, »Goldener Strom«, and »Interior«, she has created a trilogy in which sound is consistently conceived and realised in material form: clay figures, stage sets, embroidered landscapes. And now comes »Sabbatical« as a conscious, extended exhale and inhale – returning to earlier, rawer texts that conceal less and reveal more.

Rosa Anschütz’s artistic path is shaped by a distinct internationalism – not as a career strategy, but as an escape from narrow expectations and from difficult experiences with German labels and booking agencies, whose interest often lie less in genuine collaboration than in absorbing the artist into their own systems. Her record deal in the US came almost by chance through her monthly radio show on Hong Kong Community Radio, where she interweaves poetry and music – sparking the interest of Heartworm Press, a publisher primarily focused on books and poetry, who soon decided to release her music as well.

Her appearance at this year’s Pop-Kultur Festival is by no means her debut: she already performed at the Maschinenhaus in 2023 (in a much more techno-driven mode), and returned in 2024 as part of a collaboration with Black Boboi and Eddna.