REVIEW: Jebunte “Jazzma” – nra.lv

This Saturday, June 4, at the cultural site “Noah”, the domestic alternative rock band “Jebunte” will present their debut album to the general public – in fact, it should have happened already in the middle of May, but for some reason the plans changed.

The group is made up of four young people aged 16 to 18 from the Ernest Liv School of Rock Music, who, as they say, ‘experiment with music and get to know the world and themselves in a way’. The album was made over the last couple of years at the Hodila Records studio in Valmiera, the producers are the Jebunte musicians themselves with Ernest, and the rest of the material has been put together by Hodila’s owner Lomix.

Group members: Hugo Zemītis (vocals, guitar), Nils Valkiainen (bass), Kārlis Benefelds (guitar) and Kaido Lakševics (drums).

The goal of the young people is to express themselves creatively in music, and the songs, like their words, have been improvised by the whole quartet. “We have been working on this album for over a year. Creating new music is so interesting – we indulge in improvisation and spontaneous ideas, putting our feelings into the music, ”says Hugo. “We are inspired by the current world of music, and we want to put these new, creative winds into our music. What we create also changes our feelings about music, so we don’t think to stop in our work, ”says Nils Valkiainen, who is studying jazz at the Jāzeps Mediņš Riga Music High School.

Admittedly, the young people have somehow not succeeded in choosing the name of the group. Previously, they called themselves “Five Inch Mayo,” which could only be remembered because “it’s a band with something between” Five Finger Death Punch, “” Nine Inch Nails, “and” John Mayall. ” is even crazier, because they want to use “Jebunti” as a slogan, and together with an even stronger slogan… Fortunately, in music they are much better off with ideas – “Five Inch Mayo” attracted the viewer’s attention already in the “Pictures” of 2019, when they spoke with his teacher Ernest Lībieti. Sometime after the festival, the band was renamed “Jebunti”, which means “straight edge” in Japanese, “which only they themselves understand the meaning of…

There is also trouble with the name of the album – “Jazzma” is said to have been created by putting together the words “jazz” and “song”, but there is not even a reflection of the jazz band – the “live” band mostly sounds like the English version of Red Hot Chili Peppers “Experts also call it Primus.” The stylistic patchwork in the album is much bigger and completely indefinable, but it also has nothing to do with jazz. A total of 11 compositions, including the only song at the end of the hidden trek in Latvian, composed “Falling Trees” many years ago (it is crossed with a pile of fragments from several more demo recordings). Although stylistically it is hardly compatible with the rest of the sound material, during the pre-listening or presentation of the album in the café “Leningrad” (which took place in the beginning of May) it was noticeable that the audience wants to hear just that from Jebunte, and this postgran piece the most enduring. That only young people don’t get it like the legendary “Blur”, who intended their “Song 2” as a parody, but in the end it became their most famous song forever…

PAR. These young people have great creative potential – it was already felt after the primitive but memorable grand song “Falling the Trees”, but for the time being, this potential is sinking into a musical volcano, and when it wakes up or wakes up at all, time will tell. Proof of this potential is even the song “Tuesday Snack” with its superb bass line and alarming guitar, one could also highlight the hopeful postgrand song “Smart Countret People” (although it has a catastrophic lack of vocal and instrumental power), as well as something dramatic. Somebody’s It and the interesting Preamp. From these conceptual sketches could be created really good pieces – as already mentioned, the potential for these young people is.

AGAINST. It is still strong, strong, very early to release the album “Jebuntei”. Everything that the musicians themselves call experiments, improvisations and spontaneous ideas in this form is only suitable for rehearsals – it is strange that Ernest Lībietis has not been able to impress them. Some of the tracks on the album are thought to be a shame in years to come, such as “Gimme” with an unjustifiably psychedelic ending or the completely “buttery” hardcover and alternative rock mix “Smart Countret People”, and the title track “Jazzma” is also questionable. ”(The second part saves it a bit), and Hugo can’t sing several pieces normally. There are not many musicians aged 16-18, but the age of babies is no longer. Time to rise.

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