In 2001, Rainer Maria released their third album and played almost 200 shows. Yet, somehow Kyle Fischer (guitar, vocals) and Caithlin De Marrais (vocals, bass) managed to travel from New York back to Madison, Wisconsin a few times over the course of six months and make ?Open Ground?--an album of material mostly written by Kyle outside of sessions with Rainer Maria. Although the project uses the moniker of ?Kyle Fischer?, Kyle enlisted the help of Caithlin as well as Mike Kinsella (Owen, American Football, Owls) on nearly the entire record. The outcome is a much fuller, more collaborative sound than most ?solo acoustic side-projects?.