This time not a musician but about the person who did the artwork of the album: Teis Albers. I was searching for art and artwork and I stumbled across him and the stuff he did as Hypnoteis. Beautiful stuff, so I sent him an email and he responded. The result:
In the meantime, he also has been providing the Saxify remixes with artwork and animated artwork. See the Youtube video playlist here:
Teis Albers is a contemporary artist from the Netherlands. His art is a mixture of elements from nature, pop-art and street-art. From blown up trashed typography and weathered billboards to still-lifes mixed with comicbook advertisements. From the subconscious he plays with these various elements and allows the compositions to happen layer by layer. Everything comes together in a digital canvas where he has full control over size, composition and color. After that follows the physical layering with multiple prints and various materials like paint, paper and varnish.
Teis attended the school of graphic design in Eindhoven and started doing freelance work right after graduation. After several years of working and living in the city of ‘s-Hertogenbosch he recently moved to a more remote village. The contrast between city and village forms the basis for his contemporary work. Cracked walls with layers of torn posters next to nature and wide views. Crowded malls with screaming adverts and a flock of birds, forming abstract shapes.
The works are a mix of illustration, typography, photography and various compilation techniques. Teis finds inspiration in vintage stuff, street-art, comics, old brochures, travelling, film, art, nature and music, lots of music. www.teisalbers.com
This is the title track called Dark Horse. Just as in the album version it features sax and piano solos. It's a pretty wild performance, matching today's start of the Chinese New Year: THE YEAR OF THE FIRE HORSE!Live at Bimhuis, we added a drum solo. Afterwards, I decided to seperate it from the song and post it as an extra video below. Why not in one video?Because the video would become very very long and experience shows that people will not stick around for longer that 6-7 minutes. Yoràn's free drum solo is actually really great and in this seperate video, the true drum lovers can watch and learn from his drum story telling. Sometimes people ask me; What are drummers doing in their solos? To give you an idea of what Yoràn is doing in his solo: He starts with a pattern, an idea. He keeps the pattern going and plays variations over it. Then he combines it with soloing over it with call and reponse phrases and slides in new patterns. Technically it's interesting because he demonstrates a lot of independence and speed, as well as dynamics and sound colours, while telling a story, which means in musical context that the solo has certain elements which can be recognized by the (trained) listener. Many people in the Western part of the world miss the melodic and harmonic context during a free drum solo. It's fair to say a free drum solo without any accompaniment is like an abstract painting. Within the given context you can hear and see what you can manage, depending on your own frame of reference and expectations. In the end, it's about: does it resonate with you? Because both, the painting and the free drum solo, they lack a clear subject (no lyrics, no recognizable image), both forms are highly subjective and open to the interpretation of the audience. They function as a conversation between the artist's feeling and the viewer's/listener's perception.But you also can listen to it with a pure analytical drum ear and try to follow the patterns and phrases. As a musician and human I (try to) do both :-) Enjoy!More info:Susanne Alt: sax, Matthijs Geerts and Ike van Bergen: keys, Thomas Pol: bass, Yoràn Vroom: drums, Helene Jank: percussion Performed at 16th of January 2026 at Bimhuis, Amsterdam, Recorded by Onno Prillwitz Filmed by Robert Glass and Albert Nooij. - This time not a musician but about the person who did the artwork of the album: Teis Albers.I was searching for art and artwork and I stumbled across him and the stuff he did as Hypnoteis.Beautiful stuff, so I sent him an email and he responded. The result: In the meantime, he also has been providing the Saxify remixes with artwork and animated artwork. See the Youtube video playlist here:Teis Albers is a contemporary artist from the Netherlands. His art is a mixture of elements from nature, pop-art and street-art. From blown up trashed typography and weathered billboards to still-lifes mixed with comicbook advertisements. From the subconscious he plays with these various elements and allows the compositions to happen layer by layer. Everything comes together in a digital canvas where he has full control over size, composition and color. After that follows the physical layering with multiple prints and various materials like paint, paper and varnish.Teis attended the school of graphic design in Eindhoven and started doing freelance work right after graduation. After several years of working and living in the city of ‘s-Hertogenbosch he recently moved to a more remote village. The contrast between city and village forms the basis for his contemporary work. Cracked walls with layers of torn posters next to nature and wide views. Crowded malls with screaming adverts and a flock of birds, forming abstract shapes.The works are a mix of illustration, typography, photography and various compilation techniques.Teis finds inspiration in vintage stuff, street-art, comics, old brochures, travelling, film, art, nature and music, lots of music.www.teisalbers.com
