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Name: Blaue Blume
Members: Jonas Smith, Søren Jensen Buhl, Buster Jensen.
Occupation: Songwriters
Nationality: Danish
Recent release: Blaue Blume's new single "Country" is out now. They are also one of the bands performing at 2022's Reeperbahn Festival which takes place in Hamburg, Germany, September September 21st-24th. Get tickets here.

If you enjoyed this interview with Blaume Blume and would like to find out more about the group, visit them on Instagram, and Facebook.



Where does the impulse to create something come from for you? What role do often-quoted sources of inspiration like dreams, other forms of art, personal relationships, politics etc play?

I don’t have any romantic idea about where my inspiration or urge to create comes from really.

Not that I don’t think it exist for other musicians or artists, but for me it mostly comes from waking up every day, going to the studio, turning on the computer and picking up an instrument and start playing - partly warming up or practicing a specific piece of music and partly playing music. Then I start recording and sometimes something interesting comes up which I latch onto, which then in the end could be either it’s own composition or a part for a song or just a sketch.

In the end I think this is where I am most comfortable, just sitting by myself, recording, writing, playing.

For you to get started, do there need to be concrete ideas – or what some have called a "visualisation" of the finished work? What does the balance between planning and chance look like for you?

No, I mean we have never stopped making music, so the work on making new music or new ideas has been going on the whole time.

But there are of course times when the urge for releasing something is more apparent or relevant than other times. And in those periods, we are more focused and try to keep the eyes on the ball and gather the stuff which would maybe make the most sense to release in either a single or on a record.

What do you start with? How difficult is that first line of text, the first note?

I start by playing and trying a lot of stuff; being all over the place, and not having any concrete idea, but just trying a lot of ideas. Most importantly trying not to be too hard on myself in the beginning, and waiting with the analyzing / judging part of my brain until the end where I have something a bit more defined or layed out.

It’s difficult to keep these two processes separate, but I can’t do it all at once, being creative, using my intuition and at the same time policing myself; that’s too pop, that’s too noisy, that’s too corny.

Once you’ve started, how does the work gradually emerge?

Mostly it starts by Jonas showing a sketch. It could be something we recorded ages ago, but which he has edited into something entirely different; a guitarpart which has been pitched down or a small part of a drum perfomance which has been looped.

Then we move on from there; Buster records some clarinets and guitarparts and sends them back. We'll then have a conversation whether that is the right direction, and depending on what we agree upon, Buster maybe do it all over or Jonas receives the tracks and continue in that direction, and writes a melody which he then again shows the band. But then maybe this time Sørens pick it up and does a drum performance.

In the end we have a lot of material and a lot of different contributions to the composition or song, and depending which different contributions we choose to move on with, the song or composition can be a lot of different things. This is actually what I think is the hardest part of the whole process of composing; muting parts which you have fallen in love with. But because we have to be focused on the song and the entirety of what it wants, some parts will have to be killed in order for it to thrive.

Often, while writing, new ideas and alternative roads will open themselves up, pulling and pushing the creator in a different direction. Does this happen to you, too, and how do you deal with it? What do you do with these ideas?

Yes, very often. We have very much tried to always be open to a new perspective or a different way of doing things. We don’t release stuff that often, and I also believe that it’s because we work like this. It’s quite rare we don’t have a song which hasn’t been a lot of things before it ends up being what it is when it’s released, and this process just takes time and a lot of contemplation.

Also, as I said before, it requires all of us to be able to bury things we might think or feel is great in order to follow a different path which someone has come up with. This is hard and takes time, mostly just time to lick our wounds and get back up on the horse and start working again.

Creativity can reach many different corners of our lives. Do you personally feel as though writing a piece of music is inherently different from something like making a great cup of coffee? What do you express through music that you couldn’t or wouldn’t in more mundane tasks?

I have tasted cups of coffee which certainly made me feel something. But then maybe I also saw the barista being focused and putting a lot of work into it.

He may have told me the story of the beans and the farmers and why all this adds up to why this particular cup of coffee is just so great. And right there I can be struck with the same feeling as when I see a band doing a great live performance, read a good book or see a movie and etc. He wanted to express something, and I totally got it, but I’m also into good coffee and I appreciate it. I have also seen musicians play and not making me feel anything and they might as well just make the assembly line coffee at starbucks or whatever.

I do not necessarily mean that everything is art, but neither do I mean that common ways of “expressing ourselves” like music, writing or painting and so on are the only ways of expressing something. For my self at least, I have seen a lot of different people doing a lot of different things, but if it’s done with care and passion. I can be just as impressed or emotional as I am with music.

I think it very much depends on what the sender puts into it or / and what the receiver expects.