Bastian Jütte
Cover Inside

Two sides of a drummer
Bastian Jütte's compositions and sound mixtures on "Inside"

He is someone who creates highly sensitive notes with sticks, drums and cymbals. You may experience him in one of his many bands - the lean young man with the distinctive, nonhairy crown. And he is always a guarantor for subtlety. For fine rhythmic nuances - and always for drive and power: Bastian Jütte. In some concerts, he likes to take the electric guitar to play self-made indie rock. That's his other side and it also sounds good. Particularly because he knows how to write thrilling, catchy songs.
Why always one without the other? Here, you find both: the drummer and the rock-inspired songwriter. On "Inside", Bastian Jütte gathers nine of his own compositions that reflect a lot of the things he is into. "Jazz", "singer-songwriter", "indie rock" and "indie tronic" is what he mentions as influences for his own mixtures. Sometimes, the song titles point at the respective sounds - with nice puns such as "Indiefication" or "Decadance". Or: "Aaron Parks His Car" - as title of a homage to an influential young jazz piano player from the USA. The album contains hypnotic piano as well as trashily alienated drums, rocking guitar motifs that are interconnected with melancholic key-harmonies that tend to change rhythm or tempo all of a sudden; backwards running only to be soon resolved into audio tracks with edgy clarity, ironically-casual dissonants that sound like an instrumental wink; sublimely hammering bass ostinati and many pullingly beautiful melodies. It almost doesn't matter what is contained. Because you realize that it all fits nicely. It's made from a single source - and it captures you in its very own style. It has esprit and stylistic coherence.

You can certainly take these compositions apart but you can also just allow yourself to fall into them. Surrounded by experienced jazz partners such as saxophone player Till Martin, guitar player Max Frankl, piano player Christian Elsässer and bass player Andreas Kurz, Bastian Jütte manages to conjure moods that remind you of instrumental songs from time to time and of musical short films at other times. Amusing, laconic, unaffected films that render an image of our era, and which offer a personal statement in a very relaxed way. And they are touching as well - until the "Inside" of the drummer and creator will ideally also become the "inside" of the listener. Enjoy!

Roland Spiegel