Some ideas are just so good, they deserve a second chapter. Like Christian Prommer’s Drumlesson Vol. 1 album, released in 2008, which featured instrumental jazz versions of legendary techno and electronic tracks. Now the Munich-based drummer, DJ and producer returns with a second volume of inspired electro-organic cover versions. The musical mix remains ambitiously broad, from Carl Craig to Laurent Garnier, from Underground Resistance to Jean-Michel Jarre. Since the first album, the Drumlesson collective has grown from a studio concept to a fully working live band. Christian was also more directly involved in playing drums, piano and percussion. After the recording sessions, he also worked on each track in his studio, switching roles from live player to electronic producer.

As on the first album, classic Detroit techno is a key inspiration for Drumlesson Zwei. The album opens with the cinematic majesty of Sandstorms, a shimmering and seductive reworking of an obscure Carl Craig tune. Christian and his band also sink their teeth into two versions of Jaguar, the legendary dancefloor anthem by DJ Rolando and Underground Resistance’s Mad Mike Banks.

Christian and his band have also applied their open-minded jazz attitude to the cream of European house, techno and electro. The minimalist throb of Groove La Chord by Stockholm’s Aril Brikha is reborn as a futuristic tropical samba. Sleepy Hollow by the Berlinbased Stefan Goldmann becomes a kind of avant-garde film-noir soundtrack. And High Noon is a cool, moody version of an early cut by those Viennese rhythm maestros, Kruder and Dorfmeister.

French music is also well represented, with a lush chamber-jazz reinvention of Laurent Garnier’s club classic Acid Eiffel and an alluring deconstruction of Jean-Michel Jarre’s immortal electro anthem, Oxygène Part IV.

Bringing the album full circle, Drumlesson Zwei ends with Sandcastles, a sublime instrumental soundscape based on the club smash by Dennis Ferrer and Jerome Sydenham. Jazz meets house, electronic meets organic, Drumlesson Zwei is a testament to music’s limitless potential for inspiration and reinvention.

Drumlesson Zwei is not about narrow labels, fads or genres. Great music lasts forever.

Tracklist

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01. Sandstorms
02. Groove La Chord
03. Sleepy Hollow
04. Acid Eiffel
05. Oxygène Part IV
06. Jaguar Pt 1
07. Jaguar Pt 2
08. Sueno Latino
09. High Noon
10. Sandcastles