There are stories which like fairy tales find a musical determination. The treasured Ian Simmonds, who currently is performing as singer and poet on tour in Japan with a 18-piece Japanese improvisational orchestra, is responsible under his given name and as Juryman for the most innovative thrust in view of new paths on the electronic scene. He left London in 2005 and began a new chapter in the east German province of scenic Jena in Thuringia. His roots lie in the electronic innovative British scenery in the first half of the 90ís rave era. On his 2000 opus “The Hill”, Allison Goldfrapp lent elfin vocals, all the while meeting and greeting with greats of music and now he is searching for a new beginning on the German mainland.

Since 1995 he has gained friends and contacts in Jena and his often booked to perform in Club Kassablanca. Being taken with the creative spirit of the city and the musicality of the region, he has decided on an honorable ìsubmersionî in a new creative adventure with fresh inspiration. Parallel he started the live-jazz-poetry band, Wise in Time (CD “The Ballad of Den the Men” Crammed Discs), with the requisite tour, as well as vinyl releases on Musik krause.

After 2 years in Jena, Ian now needed a new space for the realization of a new unique album. From the tip of a friend, who knew a town official, he has found the perfect place: the old Castle Wendelstein in the middle of the vineyard region Unstrut valley in Burgenland Saxony-Anhalt. Renting at a very advantageous rate, he began as landlord under the influence of old walls and fascinating nature on the album “The Burgenland Dubs” after he set up his studio. Under the dictator faulty heating, rotting old windows, two hard winters with ice crystals in his beard in the morn, the folk Simmonds worked infinitely inspired and fresh like it hasnít been in 20 years in this special atmosphere.

“25 grad was the coldest I have ever been…this was a special time for me, a special experience and I think you can hear it in the music. To be that deep in nature and the atmosphere of the castle was profound for me , very inspiring. For the first time in more than 20 years I could really think space, you know, breathe, make a plan.. I am at the point in my life where that is important.” (Ian Simmonds)

Like a world traveler in a spiritual craft, Simmonds a factory of a full maritime dimension, rhythmic material lyrical moments, dramatic beat sorcery and orchestral presence without the case of monumental saturation in the network. The single cast and multifacetedstyle which are carried exceptionally, demonstrates this swinging acoustic flight of traditional instrumentation paired with modern electric sonic culture. Ian Simmonds does not shy from before an apparent locale in the afro-American music tradition and historical shoots from other musical ways and means. Here stands a perpetual form, a simultaneously synthetic and founded concrete reference. A Mecca for soul brothers and jazz novices, decoded precisely from the tonal spectrum, like the motive British Break ëní Step sense and smooth downbeat island-dom, a classic and soundtrack spot, as well as the depths and straight lines of sounds from Detroit.

Evidently held together from the basis of funk and jazz, lies the future, the past and the present tightly interwoven in a material of the modern. It all began on the bass with the extraordinary combo, the Sandals (1992-94), whose proliferation anticipated the (at the time) British-isle club innovation. As Jurymann he began to plumb the intersection of modern music with traditional. From there came unbeatable productions in the form of 12’ remixes, albums on renowned labels like SSR, Ntone, Studio !K7, Pussyfoot, G-Stone, Compost, Poets Club, and JCR. His discography belongs to a timeless innovation of entertainment bordering on analysis and passion.

Ian Simmonds album, “Burgenland Dubs” is the until now Simmonds-ish quantum-cheer in regards to beat fiddling sound research plus orchestral radiance with a humane worldview and ethos. Come together in a castle located in the idyllic Unstrut valley in Burgenland, Simmonds brushstrokes a moving manifest full of listening peak time for home and the open dance floor against a backdrop of stylistic prudishness. In a better sense, for the masses without the masses – electrical world music without the world, from a man of the world for the world!

Tracklisting:

01 Non Military Intro
02 Sands Of Tunis
03 The Esel
04 Rootz, (Album Version)
05 The Castle Dub
06 Diver
07 Speak
08 The Dog
09 Kon 1
10 Downhome
11 Dance Of Dances
12 According Too
13 Wendelstein Variations (Album Version)

1. Non Military Intro
An understanding of people through the power of music without sword or musket – the world is enough, for everyone to have a castle.

2. Sands Of Tunis
how would the sound of the orientation of an esoteric-atmosphere on a postcard be removed? Simmonds connects the night and dawn with Arab-funk to a hypnotic yearning body from rhythms, voices and melodies.

3. The Esel
Afro-Beat and Brit-Break in a virtuoso tact play, dedicated to the “destructive” animal lovers on the earth. With an amber timbre, Simmonds grinds the beat organ.

4. Rootz (Album Version)
A tight swinging filet brings one in the custody of the smooth poetic sense. You hear the story and the glistening eye of his life in Ian’s voice.

5. The Castle Dub
Ian loads the castle to the workshop with diplomatic drums. A global thought of Mediterranean context from the dance which isn’t supposed to only mean march.

6. Diver
A hook line of the relax sense hunts the George Benson guitar up to a trans-cultural fine feeling of the sound research.

7. Speak
Crackling magic and transcendental speech and complex drums meet on the cosmo-political cultivation of the accord. Thereby develops Simmonds a formula for tracks to groove to.

8. The Dog
Body jazz of the culture – sadness must be replaced by hope as tears give way to smiles. A movie of the movement spun in a meditative spiritual landscape of fully trustworthy darkness.

9. Kon 1
An examination of thoughtfulness drives a stroll through the streets. Melancholic dreams with sweeps and jazz guitar under the rigidity of 100 bpm steps; a healing shadow lain on the soul.

10. Downhome
from this club affined track of the Simmonds quill at this point is a bodily ‘down’, to be understood. The spirit is there completely awake and enjoying always still the musicality of the dance floor.

11. Dance of Dances
With an electric Cembalo there is introduced in a groove machine full of reminisce scenes from an apparently competing, silky dynamic claps and patterns.

12. According too
Spirituality was always a hallmark of good jazz. Here there weren’t any dandies told, the truth of this composition allows the hearer to transcendentally listen to himself.

13. Wendelstein Variations (Album Version)
An epic feathery jazz structured on a house basis where plastic palm fronds bloom. There is a pulsating swinging from extravagance with cigar/whiskey homed black poetry firmament and irresistible performance of the rhythmic.

References: http://www.kompakt-net.de