Leida Pello: Who is part of Jack’s Chill Out Lounge?
Kaspar Tambur: There are 7 members in our group: saxophonist Carl Tuulik. He learnt in the Berkley Summer School, and he’s going to be a prodigy. Not as a saxophonist, he’s coming up with a new vibe, he wants to go on and become a bass player. We have two singers; one is Anne Liis Puhk, she has done everything on her own. She didn’t go to a music school, like Rauno Laikjõe [the guitarist] and me. We went to the Georg Ots Tallinn School of Music and were lucky enough to be part of a community that allowed us to spread the word more easily and be in different bands. She didn’t have that comfort zone, she had to push herself, and she has done it. The other singer is Marianne Leibur, she is a multi-instrumentalist, she can play piano, and strings, and she has her own string orchestra at Gustav Adolf Grammar School that she’s leading. This year, she’s graduating the Gustav Adolf Grammar School. We have bassist player Meelik Samel, he knows how the mainstream Estonian music goes. He’s been the member of Põhja-Tallinn and Tenfold Rabbit. The drummer is Henrik Leibur, I went with him to the Nõmme Music School, and he has a strong base of classical music knowledge. We have guitarist Rauno Laikjõe. He’s all about feeling. He is a sparkle of joy, without a doubt someone that feels the guitar like Jimi Hendrix, Lenny Kravitz, Mark Knopfler, all of his favourite guitarists. And me, I want to call myself a musician. I play keys and sing and make my own music. Actually we have a pretty good team when you think about it. Everybody is very versatile.
LP: What’s Jack’s Chill Out Band about?
KT: At the start there were just four boys, doing their own music, and we discovered that for some reason, it didn’t work out that way, but we still had an amazing chemistry and we started doing ball music. And that’s what we have been doing for five years. But we now feel like we are actually ready to provide our own stuff. Until now, we were like Beatles doing other’s music and doing it every day out, so we know how people want to feel, what they want to experience. It’s about enjoying music that has been made, making people dance, and it’s not really that hard, it’s music. Jack’s Chill Out Lounge is our place where we go to have fun, it’s not meant for a big arena, it’s a ball band, it takes your mind away off the big stuff, sometimes when we have our own music projects, I have a concert coming up with violins and a band, and also Rauno has his own projects. But we all come to Jack’s Chill Out Lounge because the name says it all. It’s about having a good time.
LP: What’s the story behind Jack’s Chill Out Lounge?
KT: When we first got it we were, it’s so long, but it’s sort of grown on us. Jack’s Chill Out Lounge has changed its band members throughout time. Five years is a long time, but the core has always remained the same: Rauno and me. The name itself, it’s going to spook you, it’s randomly generated. We just went to Google and randomly generated that. And that’s what we got: Jack’s Chill Out Lounge. And we were like: ‘that’s us’.
LP: Does Jack’s Chill Out Lounge only cover other people’s songs, or you’ve got some original songs as well?
KT: There’s been a transformation. When we started we just wanted to redo different sounds of the world, like Latin, various types of swing, 1950’s rock and roll. Throughout the years, there have been certain repetitive ball themes and one of them has been the Great Gatsby. And we thought they want that Great Gatsby soundtrack music probably, where there’s mainstream music, but it’s done in old fashion or the other way around. So we’ve taken that, and with Bruno Mars’ ‘Uptown Funk’, that’s a funk song, we went back to the swing band eras and Duke Ellington. We took that song and made it into a big band song. It’s very fast. And it’s like with that movie, 50 Shades of Grey, I haven’t seen it, but it seemed doomed by the trailer, but it had a very good soundtrack, that old Beyoncé song. It’s a very slow version of that song. We took that and made it into a fast bossa nova. We’ve had fun with these things. It’s not like here’s the YouTube link, here’s the note, let’s play it like it is. We always like to mix it up and go crazy. But will we have our own music that we will play on balls; I think this step is not far. Seeing how much this transformation that we’ve been using with Gatsby: making new songs to old and old songs to new, it’s made our band feel like we have something of our own, and it works well. I think the next step is doing something of our own with the band, which actually is about having fun and without a master plan to conquer the world. It just works by itself, people invite us to perform, and we enjoy it and they enjoy it. And that’s how it should be.
LP: What’s the first song Jack’s Chill Out Lounge did?
KT: Fly Me To The Moon, it’s a great song, but if it’s done wrong, it’s yeah. You can’t just play it; it’s so dull and emotionless. Our failure was that we wanted to hit the notes perfectly. But it’s not like if you have no bad notes then it’s okay, you have to sing it along or listen to the original and try to understand why that song became popular.
LP: Are there any upcoming events?
KT: On the 29th April, there’s one in Tallinn Audentes Sports Gymnasium, it’s going to be amazing. I’m not quite certain what the topic for that is. The same week, on the 2nd May, we have one outside of Tallinn, which is rear; we are mostly actually around Tallinn.
LP: Are there any new songs coming out?
KT: This is the new step we are taking. We are going public with it. The old material you find on the Internet is very old. It’s like a different persona. That is the original assembly of people, the people who actually created the band. The Gustav Adolf Grammar School gives out every year a musical CD and we used the possibility to do demos via Gustav Adolf Grammar School, the time and date are not released, it’s uncertain. There’ll be the Great Gatsby theme, where you’re going to hear the ‘Uptown Funk’ and you are going to hear an old disco classic from Estonia called ‘Sa haara kinni’ [‘Grab my hand’].
LP: Has the past, in terms of being part of the Gustav Adolf Grammar School Principle band, has it helped you as well?
KT: Well, that’s a whole different story; the high point was the Pink Floyd tribute concert in 2010 at the Nokia Concert Hall, now it’s the Nordea Concert Hall. Most of all you learn, how to feel music, how to play in a band. I think Rauno is what I got most out of it. A real true friend and a person I’ve been doing music with throughout my life, I guess for 9 years, and it’s been wonderful.
LP: In your opinion, which songs are the biggest influencers in the Estonian music scene?
KT: That’s impossible to say. If I were to be honest, the first thing that came to my mind is this weird song: Tule kui leebe tuul [Come as a Gentle Wind] by Henry Laks. Then Gustav Ernesaks: Mu isamaa on minu arm [My Fatherland is My Love], this is the most popular oneness inducing song of the Estonian Song Festival. The purest description of Estonian nature by sound is Heino Eller: Kodumaine viis [Native Melody]. I would say the first real thorough Estonian jazz composer Raimond Valgre and his song Helmi [Helmi – Estonian female name]. And then Vaiko Eplik: Mina & Mr Bean [Mr Bean & Me], because we Estonians enjoy that goofy outcast as well.
LP: What’s your go to song, when you feel down?
KT: It changes throughout time. For uplifting music that gets you going, I would recommend this old song from Daft Punk – Crescendolls form their Discovery album, it just gets you going. And you feel like you want to dance your life away and be so joyful. At the same time, if you feel low and sentimental, a song from Mark Knopfler, from an album that sounds very familiar Get Lucky, but it has nothing to do with Daft Punk this time. It’s Monteleone. It’s so pure and so easy, it’s quite the opposite of me. Although I enjoy beautiful sounds of music, I like my messages in songs very deep and this is the absolute opposite. It’s amazing that someone has done something so easy, yet it still carries out a beautiful story. He sings about the person who made his guitar, and he does it with such passion that it’s admirable.
LP: Who is your favourite Estonian musician?
KT: Kristjan Randalu. My friend recommended me to listen to him and she put on this song: Silmast Silma [Eye to Eye] and I can’t remember what I felt. I guess I was shocked. That was the moment when I realised, oh no, I already exist. I really already exist. I see that person. What he does in music is so beautiful and what he does is what I would do, if I would have the technical abilities, if I were to become as good of a keyboardist as he is. When I listen to him, I feel like he doesn’t set the boundaries of music, that’s why I call myself musician, I don’t call myself a jazz-musician, I don’t call my self a song writer, or a composer.